


in every tree, an unseen nest

by oh_simone



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gaslighting, Gen, M/M, Pre-Slash, Secret Identity, Secrets, vaguely gothic romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-05-20 04:18:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 38,083
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14887475
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oh_simone/pseuds/oh_simone
Summary: When Credence is caught by the MACUSA after his Obscurus destroys the old church, he is sent to Greythorn Estate in upstate New York where he is to train his magic, or that failing, remain in lonely exile. But as Credence comes to find, nothing is what it seems, from the handsome but distant Mr. Graves, to the mysterious groundskeeper Zagreus, to the very house itself.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> title from Tess Gallagher's [Choices](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/48950/choices).
> 
> Huge thanks to myndii, who read and re-read and cheerleaded me when I was losing my damn mind writing this.
> 
> Edit 6/10/18: Broken into chapters now for easier consumption!

_Dear Modesty,_

_I’m sorry I couldn’t wake you before I left, but it’s your first day at the MACUSA school and I don’t want you distracted. I know you will do well; you were always the smart one. I hope you will tell me what you learn. Chastity and I only had a few years in a ward school, and I imagine your experience will be nothing like ours._

_Right now, it is pale and cold and about ten in the morning. We will be at Albany in another hour or so, but I will be staying on the train for a little while more. Although this trip is taking far longer than necessary, I don’t mind the added travel, considering what could happen mid-Apparition, with my abilities as they are. Besides, I’ve always liked train rides, and once the sun rose, the view has been indescribably scenic. I am surrounded by trees and mountains and green plains and small towns—nothing like we’ve ever seen in the city. By the time you read this though, I will have arrived at the estate of Greythorn Estate and become the charge of Mr. Graves. Ms. Tina hasn’t told me much about him, only that he is a powerful wizard, who fought in the war, and is now a very important figure in wizarding government. Greythorn is his family’s country holdings, and he has been on sabbatical this past month resolving some personal matters there, and as he has some time, he has agreed to host me for now, so that I need not remain in the holding rooms in the Woolworth. He is the director of the Aurors, which is how Ms. Tina knows him, and is also a good friend of President Picquery. I have heard he can be ill-tempered, but I’m prepared to be on my best behavior, and I hope that he will know how to help me._

_I won’t stop trying, I promise. You must be angry, but please be patient. I have hurt so many people, including our own mother and sister that I can’t abide the thought of you being hurt as well. When I am safe, we will be together again, and make a new home._

_Until then, I will write, and I hope you will write back. I miss you very much._

_Your devoted brother,_

_Credence Barebone_

 

 

Tina tugged the Portkey, an old _Saturday Evening Post_ , out from behind the corner bench of the train station and handed it to Credence. He stared down at the magazine where the Ellen Pyle illustration smoldered back, rosy-cheeked and languid-eyed.

“Another two minutes,” Tina said, checking the clock overhead, and walked them behind the station so that they wouldn’t be seen. Not like there were many people around—the meagre number of passengers who’d disembarked at this station had dispersed immediately, and there wasn’t even a station manager around this late on a Saturday afternoon. But Credence had learned nothing if not that witches and wizards suffered from an excess of caution. But viewed in context of his own upbringing, perhaps not unnecessary. Tina looked up at him and patted at his thin coat. “It’s not a long walk,” she reminded him, as if they had not discussed this three times before. “You’ll see the entrance, as soon as you arrive. He knows you’re coming, so you should have no trouble.”

“Yes, Ms. Tina,” Credence replied, and tried to smile at her. She returned it briefly before the worry lines creased her face again.

“I would take you up there if I could,” she said fretfully. By the owner’s own warnings, Greythorn was a place of old and wild magic; Credence was carrying a letter of introduction that would guide him through the forest paths, but there was no such guarantee for Tina. So, despite the several restrictions on magical travel, Portkey it was, to the borders of the estate. The MACUSA had already bent several of its usual iron-backed laws for the Barebones—one-way transport for one unusual Obscurus, to a largely deserted estate was about as far as they had been willing to go. If his stay was successful and Credence managed to control his magic, then he would be able to return on his own. If not, well. Greythorn was as pleasant a place for exile as any.

Credence nodded and smiled again, though his face felt strange and wooden. “Can I- Can I write you?”

She looked surprised, and then touched. “Of course, Credence,” she said. “I would like that very much. You can address it to me, at the fourteenth floor of the Woolworth. There should be an owlery on the grounds, from what I remember. About time, Credence,” she said. They stared at each other, uncertainly, and then she reached for him and hugged him fast and hard. “Good luck,” she whispered before releasing him and stepping back.

A storm of emotion—not the dangerous sort, but the usual roil of nerves and sadness and a little excitement surged up his throat. He swallowed and barely had time to nod before the Portkey hummed to life and snatched him away from the station.

 

When the nausea had receded and Credence was able to stand solidly again, he found himself at the head of a long, narrow foot path that cut through a forest of maples and birch trees. It was silent except for the shushing of tree limbs overhead, and the afternoon sun shadow-dappled the ground. There was a bite to the air that he’d been warned about, and he was glad that Ms. Queenie had seen fit to charm his worn gloves and scarf with heat. It had been almost a full day, and the charms were mostly lukewarm by now, but they still made him far warmer than he’d otherwise be, and hopefully they would last him the final leg of the journey.

As he approached the trail, a faint sheen before him made him pause. Above the nondescript dirt path, the air warped oddly, blurring and wavering as if intensely heated. Credence hung back warily until the odd effect coalesced into a transparent impression of a low gate, two posts and a door, freestanding. He pulled the letter of reference from his coat and hesitatingly brandished it before him. The gates bled into iron black. A tentative push at the gate did nothing; it was locked somehow. Frowning, he peered past one side of the gate, then the other, but that didn’t seem right—this was a magical place, and he had a feeling the only way to his destination was through the locked gate. He rattled it but froze when a sucking wind seemed to whistle through the iron bars. A prickling at the back of his neck made him stiffen; there was the distinct sensation of being watched.

“Hello? Mr. Graves? My name is Credence Barebone, I’ve arrived,” he said lamely. There was no reply.

Credence bit his lip uneasily and glanced at the Portkey. He ran his hand idly over the gate, feeling for a lock or latch and flinched when a rough edge of the black iron caught the flesh at the base of his thumb. With a hiss, he jerked his hand back, but blood was already welling from the cut. It wasn’t too deep though, and he was dabbing at the blood with his sleeve when a small click sounded. A violent gust of wind swept past him, flipping his coat tails and plucking at his hair. Before him, the gate door swung open.

Credence looked about him, but the wind died as suddenly as it had started and he was still alone. He straightened up tentatively and stepped through onto the proper path, hearing the gate swing shut behind him with a faint click. He glanced back in time to see the iron fade back into invisibility.

There was little choice except to continue. The case he’d brought was small and not too heavy—he had very little, even before unwittingly bringing down the church on Pike Street. His time in MACUSA detention had been similarly bare of material goods, and while the Goldsteins were kind enough to furnish him with necessities when he was released into their care, they had little to spare themselves. It was of no matter; earthly materials corrupted the soul and spirit, and besides, Credence was not in the habit of forming attachments to items anyhow. It certainly made the walk down to the manor less strenuous.

The path was relatively straight, but Credence imagined magic might be involved; around him, the forest ground rose and dipped in cragged hill side and gentle meadows showered in golden leaves. Even if Tina hadn’t warned him, he would have feared to venture off the path. For a city dweller, born and raised as he was, these undeniably beautiful woods were too wild and unsettling beyond the safe boundaries of packed dirt and worn stones. It was too quiet, and he might have feared he’d gone deaf but for the wind and occasional birdsong. After ten minutes of steady walking, the light ahead grew stronger, an end to the woods. Credence increased his pace, taking care not to slip—his thin-soled boots had barely been up to city streets, and fared little better on this forest path.

Overhead, the tree branches thinned and the sun’s rays gave the forest around him a golden cast that almost took his breath away. Credence slowed, then stopped some yards shy of the tree line. The air was crisp, if cold, and full of scents he’d never encountered before. Shafts of light cut through the branches, spotlighting forest vines and white birch and red and orange leaves. Rustling from above made him look up just as a small golden bird flashed by. It was breathtakingly pastoral, and perhaps that was also the source of the unsettling awareness of… being observed.

Faintly came the sound of footsteps tramping through the woods. Credence turned his head, peering into the depths of the woods and froze.

There was a man, just visible amongst the shadows and trees. He was dressed for the outdoors, a flat cap low on his head and a heavy gray jacket over. He was digging—hard lurching movements, the violent drive of his arms thrusting down into the earth, and then rearing back with a full shovel. The man gave one final heave and then knelt, half-hidden in the undergrowth. Then, with a cool efficiency of movement, he unsheathed a long knife from his belt and drew it sharply across his own forearm.

Credence cried out before he could stop himself and the man looked up from his arm, now coated in dark blood that streamed down into the dirt. He was an old fellow, face wreathed in shadows and forbidding lines, and though he was far away, there was a shocked, hostile air to him. Around them, the wind picked up suddenly, whistling through the trees and rattling the branches with almost birdlike shrieks.

The woods fell still again, and the old man straightened abruptly, wiping the blade on his trousers. Credence forced himself to stumble away quickly, trembling, towards the tree line. He half expected the man to come after him with the long, wicked knife that gleamed, even half buried in shadows, but his departure was unmolested, though he could feel the gaze of that huntsman burning his shoulders down to the bone.

Compared to that welcome, the sight of Greythorn was less outrageous, if still impressive. Beyond the trees, the path crossed a broad meadow crowned by a Tudor mansion that was larger than just about any house Credence had ever seen. It was a sprawling, two-story complex of dark brick and timber and sharply sloped roofs shingled in black. The path before it widened into a gravel road that was wide enough to accommodate several cars, or a horse drawn carriage, for that matter, and a rose bush bare of blooms tangled itself over one wall, the bare stalks of poppies just below.

Daunted, shaken, and now very chilled, Credence picked his way through the garden path and up the low stone steps. The pitched portico was dimly lit by a small lamp above the paneled door. He swallowed and pressed the doorbell. It rung deep and resonant, and Credence nearly jumped out of his skin when he realized the carved stone eagles that flanked the door seemed to be eyeing him curiously.

There was a long silence. Credence was too terrified to move in case the eagles decided he was unwelcome and attacked. He was wondering if perhaps Mr. Graves was not in this afternoon when the door swung open.

“Yes?” said the man who answered the door. He was tall, only an inch or so shorter than Credence, and had the bearings of a soldier and the shoulders of a boxer. There was a streak of white in his otherwise black hair, and he stared at Credence with frank astonishment. Credence nearly quailed.

“M-Mr. Graves?” he managed. “I’m Credence Barebone.”

“Credence… Barebone?” Mr. Graves echoed, lifting a single eyebrow. “How… did you get here?”

Credence stared back in some consternation. “I’m to be your charge? I- I came up through the gated pathway.” He hated the way his voice shook, and his shoulders were tight enough to crack, and the miserable yawing pit in his stomach was churning and acidifying—

“Right, yes,” Mr. Graves said slowly. “The… gated path.” He stared hard at Credence for another moment and then smiled. The abruptness of which he began radiating a handsome charm was almost devastating. “My apologies, Credence. I… must have gotten my dates wrong. Please, come in.”

“Thank you,” Credence said with perhaps more feeling than warranted. “I oh, this- this might help, a letter from Auror Goldstein, here.”

The director took the folded envelope, ushering Credence inside. The entrance hall was lofty, with gleaming walnut floors and a pitched ceiling crossed with black timber beams. “Thank you. My word, you look pale as milk! It must have been a frigid walk,” Mr. Graves said, leading him through an arched entry way and into a parlor, where he ushered him into the armchair closest to an enormous, unlit fireplace. Credence sank gratefully into the cushions, his limbs trembling from cold and his mind still fixated with the odd scene he had witnessed. He chafed his hands uncertainly, glanced about the parlor to settle his mind. The ceilings and walls were crossed with smooth wood, stained dark and glossy, and heavy carpeting covered the hardwood floors to an inch. Intricate wood marquetry of stylized flowers covered the tables and chairbacks in the room, and thick velvet curtains half-hid the windows from sight. It was undeniably luxurious, but Credence thought more light might have improved its morose charm. He rallied enough to politely remark upon the setting.

“Oh, yes,” Mr. Graves said, solicitously floating over a glass of water. “Quaint, isn’t it? But it’s been in the family for an age, and one doesn’t just… sell magical properties as this.” An undecipherable look flashed over his face. "They can be quite... difficult."

Credence nodded as if he understood any of the nuances. “Ms. Tina had said that it’s, ah, Un…”

“Unplottable, Unfindable, indeed,” Mr. Graves said, settling into the chair across from him. “I imagine you had a devil of a time getting here.”

Credence nodded again, and Mr. Graves laughed, an odd twist to his stern mouth. “But it’s beautiful,” Credence hastily added, uncertain if he had offended.

“All these old piles are, in their own way,” Mr. Graves said, waving dismissively. He saw Credence’s expression and laughed again, somewhat self-deprecatingly. “Never mind, my boy. I’ve been here by myself for too long.”

Credence drank his water slowly to gather his thoughts. “Is- is it only yourself, sir?” he ventured.

“Myself, yes.” He peered at Credence quizzically, before his expression cleared. “There is a groundskeeper here as well, an old curmudgeon. Ah! I note from your expression you’ve met good Zagreus Reeves.”

“I, well,” Credence stammered, somewhat relieved to slot his odd earlier encounter into a less sinister view. “Not as such. I saw him, in the woods. He- looked to be occupied, and I didn’t want to bother him.”

“And you wouldn’t! Don’t take offense at his coarseness,” Mr. Graves said with a smile. “He’s an awful grouch, but he’s been with the family and this house for years.”

Credence returned a tentative smile but found himself fighting back a yawn instead. Mr. Graves slapped his thigh.

“My most heartfelt apologies, Credence. You must be tired and hungry after your journey. Let me show you upstairs, and then we shall meet downstairs for dinner in half an hour?”

Mr. Graves led him back to the entrance hall and up a grand staircase that turned on a landing. On the second floor, the corridor seemed to stretch far longer and wider than was possible. No less than ten doors lined a single side of the hall. Credence glanced nervously at Mr. Graves, who smiled and inclined his head.

“You may choose any of them,” he said and Credence ventured down a few steps before his anxiety overtook him and he touched his hand to the third door down. It opened easily enough to a spacious bedroom with seafoam-green walls speckled with intricate gold tracery and whitewashed ceilings. The furniture was dressed in Holland covers still, but Mr. Graves gestured wandlessly, and they rose into midair and neatly folded themselves into a stack, leaving behind a room that was fully furnished, if several decades out of fashion. A full-sized bed with ornately carved posts sat against the wall, a black sea chest at its foot. The roll-top writing desk was a match for the bed frame and was positioned just under the furthest set of windows where it could catch the most sunlight that wavered through the seeded glass. Another wave of Mr. Graves’ hand, and the window curtains untied themselves and hung loose in a pale gold wave to the ground.

“Will this do?” Mr. Grave said, and Credence, speechless, nodded. “It’s a bit small, I suppose.”

“Oh, it’s not at all,” Credence ejaculated, then flushed when Mr. Graves blinked at him. “Small, I mean. It’s- it’s very nice.” Credence though that it might have been the nicest room he’d ever seen.

Mr. Graves smiled politely, a thin press of his lips, and after a moment stepped back. “Well, I shall leave you to be settled, and ah, review Goldstein’s notes,” he said, and left Credence in the biggest room he’d ever had to himself. It took bare moments for him to hang in the massive wardrobe his coat and spare, drab suit, the cheap shirts and pajamas that had been purchased with the small MACUSA allowance, and the lovely soft scarf that Queenie Goldstein had looped about his neck at the train station. He placed his notepaper and pens on the writing desk, and after a hesitant moment, tucked the slim pine wand, simply varnished with a plain resin handle into his inside coat pocket. His battered old case went into the sea chest, and then there was still over ten minutes before dinner.

Credence looked about the room, and thought how nice it looked, with its green walls and high, sloping ceilings and wide windows. Full of light and warmth. The bedspread was soft and springy, the small fireplace tidy and ready to be lit with a spell or a long match. He walked to the mullioned windows and peered through the glass, then unlatched the frame and leaned against them hard until they swung out. Instantly, a chill breeze swept past him, ruffling his hair and curtains alike. He could see, from this superior height, far more of the woods below, stretching towards the horizon in gentle waves of yellows and reds. He couldn’t see the path he’d arrived on but noted that had he come up towards the back of the house, would have passed by a small, neat pond in the woods that formed a perfect natural mirror for the sky above. Just visible if he leaned out was a corner tower at the end of the manor that climbed higher than the rest of the building—the owlery, Credence guessed. He stood at the window and allowed his gaze to roam across the distance and felt his city-bred skin crawl at the—unspoiled nature of it all, not another soul or evidence of human life in sight.

Well, that wasn’t quite so correct. Credence spotted the groundskeeper emerging from the woods, hands empty but for a slack burlap sack slung over his shoulder. He walked with the stiff gait of someone in pain, but it must have been an old injury for his speed was undiminished. Head and shoulders hunched bullishly forward, he cut across the green clearing at a rapid pace and disappeared around the corner of the manor so that Credence could not see him anymore. His senses prickling uncomfortably below his skin, Credence scratched his hand absently and pulled away from the window. Something about that man was unsettling.

It must only be their odd not-meeting, Credence thought. Ma had often accused him when he was Modesty’s age, of suffering from an excess of imagination.

 

 

            Credence arrived promptly on the hour for dinner, having brushed his coat into a slightly less shabby state and run some polish over the same pair of boots he’d worn for years. Mr. Graves was waiting in the parlor, in an elegant silk jacket that glimmered green in the firelight and escorted him courteously through the adjoining hall to dinner. The dining room was, like the rest of the house, a masterful example of a place out of time—nothing in it seemed to have arrived after 1880 or so. The heavy curtains were drawn back, and spells lit the lamps and chandelier, but only light enough so that the diner might see what was being spooned and forked. The table was a grandiose oaken beauty, set in the center of the room and rather abbreviated in length. As if to make up for that, its top was stacked with an embarrassment of dishes, sumptuous and lavish. Credence goggled at the whole roasted suckling pig, the aspic shaped as a carp, out-of-season asparagus in butter, and other extravagances he'd never imagined before.

“This is dinner?” he couldn’t help asking as Mr. Graves gestured to the seat. It was horrifically indulgent; Ma would have sooner torched the table than let anyone touch such temptation.

“Yes. A bit much for two of us, isn’t it?” Mr. Graves said with an odd smile as if he was taken aback by the spread as well. He glanced up, catching Credence's startled expression. “Ah, well, I’ve very little input in the kitchen. No cook; old wizarding homes like these, they take care of their own.” He glanced around, a bemused twist to his mouth.

They sat, Credence painfully stiff on the fine chairs of striped green silk and watched, half awed, half frightened as soup ladled itself into his dish, a clear, celery scented broth. A bottle of wine dipped and poured its contents into his glass before he could wave it off; it did not offer Mr. Graves the same courtesy, who seemed to prefer to pour his own dark wine from a flask anyhow. Credence waited for grace to be said, but when Mr. Graves picked up the spoon and began to eat, Credence followed suit.

It was quiet at first, and Credence followed the cues of his host, though he fumbled with the wrong fork and nearly made a disaster of the table attempting to transport the aspic to his plate.

As Credence apologized and Mr. Graves spelled away the mess, the front door slammed and heavy, uneven footsteps thumped down the hall.

“Ah,” Mr. Graves said. “That would be Mr. Reeves. Ho, there!”

The grizzled groundskeeper paused with marked reluctance at the entrance of the dining hall. Curiosity overwhelmed Credence's apprehension and he twisted in his seat to observe the newcomer up closes. Mr. Reeves was a weathered old man, well into his sixtieth decade, with a hard jaw and skin like dried apples. He had dispensed of his burlap sack, but the heavy coat, dusted with dirt and dark stains, as well as his mud-streaked shoes showed him to have otherwise been outdoors. There was no evidence of blood or injury on his sleeved arms. When he looked over at the dining room table, his face was set in a stony scowl, the gray eyebrows drawn close and tight over a set jaw. Credence noted these features and dropped his gaze.

“This is Mr. Credence Barebone, Mr. Reeves. Credence, Zagreus Reeves. He is to be staying here, to improve his magical skills. Be good to him, you hear?” Mr. Graves said, mock sternly.

Reeves wiped his face with the back of one, work-callused hand and said nothing, but his furious gaze switched to Credence with such intensity that Credence shrunk back instinctively.

“Why don’t you join us for dinner,” Mr. Graves suggested jovially. “We don’t stand on ceremony here, so far from civilization! See, you may sit across from Credence here.” His eyes glittered with some unidentifiable light, a knowing one, or mocking, perhaps. The old groundskeeper’s lips only curled with distaste.

“Ain’t for me,” he said curtly, and continued off into the back of the house without waiting for dismissal.

Mr. Graves laughed, though Credence couldn’t understand the humor in the encounter. His own hairs stood on the back of his neck, and he could not but think of the strange violence Zagreus was capable of. The anxiety made the prickly, swelling darkness dance under his skin uneasily, but nothing more, thank God.

“Don’t mind old Zagreus,” Mr. Graves chuckled. “He is forever in a mood.”

“Has- has he been here long?” Credence asked.

“Oh, quite,” Mr. Graves said, smiling faintly. “Quite. This old house wouldn’t stand without him! It's why it allows him such liberties—as do I.”

“The house does, sir?” Credence echoed.

Mr. Graves said, “Greythorn is an old, magical place. And old magic, they can act in funny, unpredictable ways.” His handsome face was stern. “Be careful, Credence. Sometimes, Greythorn seems to have a mind of its own.”

 

Shortly after dinner, Credence went to bed. It was early, but he had gotten in the habit of it—while interned in the basement of the Woolworth, there had been little to occupy his time after business hours besides read the strange and whimsical books his overseers had given him and write letters to Modesty. There was no need to send anything to Chastity, who didn’t remember him or Modesty, nor to Mary Lou, who had succumbed to her injuries after Credence had lost control of his temper and consequently, the Obscurus.

Out here, the sky darkened even sooner than in the city; Credence washed in the bathroom, a dim room of green damask walls stenciled with poppies and laid with white-and-black tiles. The water in the roll-top tub ran haltingly at first, and the stream alternated between ice cold and scalding hot until the regulating spells kicked in properly. Credence managed a properly warm bath, and even though he only filled half the bath as he was accustomed, the air was soon heated and damp. He allowed himself to linger in the water a while longer, and then dried and dressed hurriedly, avoiding his own reflection as much as possible, and crept back to his room on cold, bare feet.

The hall was dark and quiet, the lamps only at half light, so it was excusable that Credence neither saw nor anticipated the shadowy bulk of Zagreus Reeves. They collided—well, Credence collided, while Zagreus allowed the impact—and Credence would have lost his balance had the groundskeeper not reached out and steadied him with a firm grip.

“I’m sorry,” Credence said, somewhat breathless with alarm and shock. “I didn’t see you.”

“What’d you tell him ‘bout me?” Zagreus snarled softly, his grip hard.

Credence gaped. “No-Nothing!”

“Good.” The old groundskeeper was shorter than him, but his presence more than made up for it. “You say nothing to him about what you saw. Understand?”

Credence nodded jerkily.

Zagreus gave him a dark look and pushed away from the wall. “You shouldn't be here,” he said tersely, dark eyes burning into his.

“I’m sorry?” Credence repeated nonsensically and clutched his clothes to himself.

"You don’t know anything, you—don't have shoes," Zagreus said in a different tone of voice, and Credence flushed with embarrassment, his bare toes curling into the stiff carpet.

"Oh, ah, they're... in the room," Credence said weakly, but Zagreus only scowled. He thumped the wall with one hard fist.

"You should have gotten slippers," he said darkly, and turned on his heel, a grim look over his face. Credence watched him go, heart thundering away in his chest, and tried to swallow away the taste of magic—ozone, and something like pine—from his mouth.

 

Morning dawned weakly, the sun filtering through a thick layer of cloud cover. Credence awoke at the sound of footsteps creaking past his door. His first reaction was to scramble to get dressed and report to… but there was nothing to report to, not as it was. It was still early enough that he didn’t feel too indulgent in dozing against the soft down pillows another few minutes. The bed was luxurious in a way he never could have imagined. So soft, with blankets so thick in fact, that he had slept uneasily and restlessly. At some point, he’d woken up shivering miserably after having kicked off the covers, and pathetically, had been sleeping better for it. When he did manage rest, they were shrouded with strange dreams—figures with faces obscured by the black scrawls of a child, the echoing scrapes of keys turning in their locks, and shadow monsters that seemed to have many eyes and many fingers. He rubbed at his temple and stared up into the canopy of his bed. They had not felt frightening, but unsettling nevertheless. With a sigh he rolled into a sitting position. The bed was too soft, but whoever complained about that?

Under his feet the floorboards were warm—whether from the water pipes or magic, Credence wasn’t sure, but he was glad for it as he padded to the wardrobe. Spare as his options were, he was soon dressed in a fresh shirt, over which he donned his striped vest and black wool jacket. They were thankfully dry. He brushed his hair back; the locks were longer than they had been in years, starting to curl at the ends. Perhaps he should borrow a pair of scissors for a trim, but perhaps he’d let it grow and see how far it coiled.

The mountain air was chilly but clean and Credence shouldered open the windows so that his room was flooded by the scent of dew and forest. From his perch, the woods before him seemed quiet and subdued by the overcast sky, the lake a blank, pale sheen in the distance. Below, a backdoor slammed. Credence crossed his arms on the ledge and peered out of the window. A head of thick gray hair appeared on the flagstones that lined the outside of the manor. Zagreus Reeves fit his flat cap on his head and glanced about him. Then, as if feeling the weight of Credence’s curious gaze, he glanced up.

Shying away from the window, Credence pulled the glass shut, heart hammering at being caught watching. After a moment, he crept forward and eased the window pane open a smidge, but Zagreus was already gone.

 

The manor was soft and solemn in gray morning light. Credence made his way downstairs and made his way back to the dining room, and from there to a kitchen that was about the size of the Goldstein’s apartment, with a wood oven and a stove and a granite-topped island bearing cutting boards and bowls of fruit. Unlike the rest of the house, the kitchen looked occupied; magic was rife in the air, scraping dirty plates without supervision and gently warming the oven, but the nicks and stains of use were still obvious in the counters and corners of the room. Credence had never enjoyed cooking—had had no particular feeling towards the task, as a matter of fact, but he thought this kitchen, with high, white-washed walls and wide, north facing windows must make cooking most pleasant. A smile tugged at his mouth; Queenie Goldstein would faint at the sight of it. Across from him was another doorway into a semi-circular breakfast room, a charming space with tiles of black and sienna-red floral patterns and soft yellow walls that caught and held the sunlight from the windows that encircled the rounded outer wall. At the far end of the kitchen, a door exited to the back of the house, and, Credence thought as he peeked outside, presumably the very one he’d spotted Zagreus leaving from earlier. He ventured into the breakfast room and saw that the table was already set with a place setting as well as a carafe of coffee and a basket of rolls.

“…For me?” Credence said out loud. There was no verbal response, but the napkin floated from the table and hung in midair, waiting to tuck itself over his lap. “I can do that myself,” he said, and it lay back on the table obligingly. He sat down and poured himself coffee. There was food already on the plate: bacon, brown bread toast, half a grapefruit, cereal with sugar and cream mixed in. Nothing, to his great relief, quite as sumptuous as dinner last night, if still more lavish than the black coffee and stale bread roll to which he was accustomed.

Credence sat uneasily in his seat, sipping his coffee and watching the clock’s hand move further along. Finally, he gave in after twenty minutes and broke his fast; perhaps Mr. Graves was not one for early meals. His sister Chastity had been like that—easily took sick if she had more than unbuttered toast and milky coffee before noon. He chewed the bacon, swallowed it along with any regret and melancholy that had risen up at the thought of her.

At ten past nine, there came a great clattering of noise. Credence looked up as the backdoor slammed shut and the stomping of heavy working boots moved closer. Zagreus filled the doorway of the breakfast room, stopping abruptly as he caught sight of Credence.

“I- good, uh,” Credence lurched to his feet, bumping his legs on the table and clattering the dishes riotously. He lunged for the tilting coffee carafe and burned his fingers on the hot silver, jerked back, and nearly upset his balance all over again. Heat suffused his cheeks as he stood stiffly, his tongue too thick with embarrassment to say anything else.

But the snide words didn’t come. Credence heard Zagreus sigh and step in to the room.

“You got more coffee?” he asked gruffly, tipping an empty mug at him and Credence scrambled to lift and pour the silver carafe. “Thanks.”

With a curt nod, Zagreus spun on his heel and left, heading out through the dining room to the rest of the house. Credence set the carafe down and slithered back into his seat, uncurling his shoulders from their unconscious hunch and picked up his fork again, the tines dragging over the porcelain plate.

Above the arched entry way, a clock chimed, startling Credence into looking up. The hands were nowhere near the half hour, but that wasn’t what caught his attention—instead, floating words hovered in calligraphic, pearlescent letters in midair: _Meet in the foyer._

 

Mr. Graves was dressed for the outdoors. Over his charcoal gray sweater and corduroy knickerbockers, he wore a sturdy olive-green coat, nipped in at the waist in a distinctly military style. His head and feet were covered in brown—wool hat above and leather boots below. He was adjusting gloves as Credence came through the entryway.

“There you are, Credence,” Mr. Graves said, gesturing him over. “Good morning. I thought I might show you the grounds today.”

“Of course,” Credence hastened to agree, and ran to fetch his coat. When he returned, Mr. Graves’ eyebrows rose slightly. It was significantly cooler today than it had been yesterday.

“You must have very thick skin,” Mr. Graves quipped amused. “Or do you use spells?”

“Neither,” Credence said as they went through the door. “I suppose I didn’t pack properly. I’ve never been away from the city.” He bit back explaining that he’d brought everything he owned, and his belongings had never included a proper greatcoat for the city or elsewhere for that matter.

“Well, never mind,” Mr. Graves said with a pityingly look; Credence flushed, but the other man didn’t seem to notice or care for his discomfort. He clapped a firm hand over Credence’s thin shoulders and steered them down the front step. To either side of them, the stone birds of prey hunched away, but Credence’s attention had frozen on the warm arm that wreathed his shoulders. The heat, compounded by the unexpected physicality was shocking and Credence’s breath hitched. He almost missed the next step, would have stumbled had Mr. Graves’ firm hold not been bracing him up. “Alright there?”

“Fine, sir,” Credence managed, and concentrated on keeping pace with Mr. Graves’ brisk stride rather than swaying further into that open embrace. For Mr. Graves, it may have been a simple gesture of camaraderie, but on Credence, the crook of elbow along the back of his neck, the gentle pressure of thumb in the divot of his shoulder, chest and torso radiating heat along his side—it was unspeakably alien.

Down the main path they went, Mr. Graves steering them into the woods from which Credence had emerged yesterday. His tour of the grounds was perfunctory, pointing out a shed and the rose garden off past the east wing with the air of someone who never remembered nor thought much of their existences.

“Do you spend much time here, Mr. Graves?” Credence asked as they crunched down the wooded path at a steady pace.

“Not at all,” Mr. Graves said, gaze straight ahead. “It’s been in the family for generations. No one has lived here in years. I rent a townhouse on the Upper East Side.”

“Why are you selling it now? I’m sorry, if that’s forward,” Credence added hastily, but Mr. Graves didn’t seem to take offense. He just gave Credence an amused look.

“No point in keeping it,” Mr. Graves said, dismissive. “It’s outdated, isolated. There’s no usefulness in this property,” he said, and there was a strange undertone to his words that Credence couldn’t quite parse.

“It’s beautiful land,” Credence said.

Mr. Graves raised his eyebrows. “It’s got natural charm, I suppose. You say you’ve never left the city? Why is that?”

So, as they traipsed down the wood path, through the golden limbed birches, Mr. Graves prodded the story of Credence’s mishaps from him. His sad, bleak childhood in the orphanage, then Mary Lou’s austere care, the strange instances of property destruction that had nothing in common except that the victims had been unkind to the Barebones, and the night he returned home to catch Mary Lou raising her belt to Modesty.

“And then?” Mr. Graves asked when Credence fell silent. They were walking slower now, the trees thick about them, the breeze taking a chill note that hadn’t been present earlier.

“And then the MACUSA showed up,” Credence said, shrugging. The rest was common enough knowledge within the upper echelon of MACUSA’s executive and security departments; Tina had debriefed Mr. Graves herself a few months ago, when he and Modesty had first been taken into MACUSA custody, shortly after the church had been demolished and Chastity’s memory wiped.

“Your sister, Modesty, she is younger, correct?” Mr. Graves said, and seemed about to say more when they stopped abruptly.

Before them the small freestanding gate had materialized again, silent and expectant. The arm slung over Credence’s shoulder tightened and Mr. Graves’s breath hissed sharply through his teeth.

“Would you like to turn back?” Credence ventured. His companion shook his head.

“This is the gate you came through?” Mr. Graves asked as they walked up to the black gate. His hand reached out and hovered above the wrought iron.

“I think so,” Credence said, blinking and turning his head over his shoulder. That strange sensation of being observed was present again. “Are- are there wild animals here?”

“What?” Mr. Graves rapped sharply, stiffening. “What do you see, Credence?”

“Just… feels like we’re being watched,” Credence whispered.

“Open the gate,” Mr. Graves ordered, one hand coming up with a wand in his grasp. He never lost his grip on Credence’s shoulder, though now it was tight and almost painful.

Credence tried. Again, there was no visible lock or hinge. He pushed and pulled but the gate stayed firmly closed while the wind gusted in sharp, cold bursts about them. “It’s locked, sir,” he said.

“Well how did you get in yesterday?” Mr. Graves demanded brusquely.

“I, I don’t know, it just… swung open,” Credence said, patting the edge iron bars and running his hands down the sides. “Oh, maybe if I just…” He stepped aside, thinking to go around to the other side of the gate, breaking contact with Mr. Graves.

“Wait!” Mr. Graves shouted, but his voice was almost swallowed by a horrendous roaring of wind that swept through the trees and almost tackled them off the path. Credence was knocked sideways; there was a shrieking in his ears that was animalistic and agitated. He gripped the gate post, hunching against the wind and the gate seemed to budge open, just a little, to even more furious battering of wind— Hands clamped down on his shoulders and dragging him upright. Under his grip, the gate jerked closed.

With a final rush, the wind died, not even the lingering echoes of disturbed foliage to be heard. Credence’s heart was racing, his pulse pounding so hard it shook his wrists. Mr. Graves hauled him back onto the path, jostling him back into motion.

“Don’t do that again,” he said, and it looked like a snarl except he sounded breathless. Credence nodded, not even sure what he meant.

“What happened?” Credence croaked. Mr. Graves kept a hold of his forearm as they went back up the path towards the house. “What- what was that?”

“Greythorn,” Mr. Graves said darkly, but didn’t make any more effort to explain. His expression was so grim that Credence held his tongue against the automatic demand for further explanation. They returned to the house in complete silence, and he didn’t mention the shadowy figure, something large and fierce with glittering eyes that seemed to be watching them from high up in the woods, just beyond the gate.

 

Not until they had mounted the stone step to the front door of the house did Mr. Graves remove his hold on Credence. The door swung open after the stone eagles noted them from their perch and Mr. Graves murmured a brief excuse and made to go upstairs.

“Uh, Mr. Graves,” Credence called as he ascended the main staircase. “What- what about the lessons?”

“Lessons? Magic lessons, you mean?” Mr. Graves asked, brows furrowed. When Credence nodded, he smiled stiffly. “Ah, yes. Well. I have some matters that require my attention presently, and we shall have to run some evaluations before that should take place. I’m afraid they might need to wait a few days while I catch up on my work—do you mind?

“Not at all,” Credence assured hastily. “Thank you. For everything.”

“Of course,” Mr. Graves said.

“Is there anything I can do in the meantime?” Credence asked.

“There is plenty to keep you occupied,” Mr. Graves said. “The grounds are extensive, and there are several amenities within the house as well—a library, a game room, a music room, a potions lab in the cellar as well.”

“Oh, I thought I might assist you, in your work?” Credence asked hopefully. “I can take notes.”

Mr. Graves smiled. “No, no, Credence, that won’t be necessary. There are dictation spells that will do the same for me, and with far less effort. I’m afraid there’s not much to be done for now. Think of your time here like a… holiday. Enjoy what this place has to offer,” he said with a sharp, sardonic smile. “I’m sure it’s all quite new for you.”

Credence nodded awkwardly, but he had already mounted the top of the staircase and vanished into the interior of the manor.

 

Idleness was sinful, Ma used to say, and while Mary Lou had been wrong about many things, that was one tenet she had driven too deep to be dislodged. Credence looked around the foyer helplessly—would anything be in need of cooking, cleaning perhaps?

 But the house was full of old Magic—dust refused to gather in corners and surfaces, food appeared on the dining table when one sat down, lights brightened and dimmed, following your path through the rooms.

There were two wings that flanked the central entrance hall; to the west was the dining room and kitchen, and to the east was the parlor and the library. In both sections were several other closed-up rooms, so draped with dust covers that it was difficult to guess at their original purpose. Credence lingered in the library, pressing his hands against the wood paneling and tracing the movement of dryads as they darted along the carved molding that decorated the book shelves. They couldn’t speak, unlike some of the other paintings he had seen in the Woolworth, but they were bold, holding his stare and laughing silently, mocking the abashed wave he made.

He left the library and wandered into a sunny hall banked with windows on one side, and intricate wooden wainscoting on the other. Carved naiads frolicked and sunbathed along lakes of inlaid mother-of-pearl, and fascinated, Credence followed one particularly energetic nymph as she flitted down the hall, cheerfully disregarding the borders that separated the panels. At the end of the hall, she leaned into the trunk of a reddish oak tree and blew him a cheeky kiss. He waved back after a beat and turned around to find himself at the threshold of an office, or a study perhaps, with dark green wallpaper and leather armchairs. The chinoiserie lamps blinked on as he entered cautiously. Paintings hung on the wall, mostly portraits, but what he’d taken for wallpaper was a mural, a proper trompe l’oeil made to look as if the room extended into an arcade of sorts, a faded blue sky and garden beyond and vines spilling past the archways and marble balustrade; bright orange and blood-red poppies bloomed past it in the garden, so thickly that it was difficult to make out anything else in the background.

Cabinets of porcelain collectibles and low bookshelves ran along the length of the room, and a massive fireplace, even larger than the one in the front parlor and its mantel nearly the height of Credence’s chin, dominated the back wall. Glazed green tiles bordered the inside of the fireplace, and it was topped by a flat mantel that displayed an ornate gilded Louis Quatorze clock, which looked as if it belonged in a scientific museum rather than a country manor. Over the glass globe of golden, spinning gears, a golden eagle with ruby eyes was perched, its wings outspread across the top of the clock. A heavy black fire screen was unfolded before the marble hearth.

“Well, you are new,” one framed portrait noted, arching a fine black brow and leaning forward to peer at Credence through a quizzing glass. “I suppose _he_ wouldn’t have seen fit to inform the portraits we should have guests,” she said ironically and frowned. She—at least, Credence thought out it might be a she, from her musical voice, rouged lips, and the inscription on the frame that declared her to be B. M. G.—was styled in a rather masculine fashion, in a stiff military jacket strung with medals and dark curls arranged in the Brutus style.

“My name is Credence,” he said, sidestepping the implied critique of his host.

“Ah, yes?” she asked. “A guest of That Man, I presume?”

“I—yes?” Credence replied uncertainly. The portrait leveled an icy stare at him and dropped the quizzing glass. “I’m here to assist Mr. Graves. MACUSA sent me.”

“Oh?” she brightened. “Excellent. Never did like to ask for help, that child. But I’m dashed if I understand how you’re to help, young man. You may call me Beryl. Beryl Montagu Gr-”

The sound of footsteps cut her off, and shortly after, Zagreus entered from the opposite doorway. He stopped short when he saw Credence before Beryl’s portrait and scowled ferociously.

“The hell’re you doing here?” he demanded. Made as if to rush Credence from the room, but stopped short of him, midway across the room.

“Nothing!” Credence said. Zagreus was just an old man, but he’d had strength and confidence, enough to cut his own wrist with no hesitation and Credence couldn’t help thinking about that sure, confident slash of his knife, the black upwelling of blood. His palms were abruptly damp, his heart erratic with adrenaline, and tremors rattled his limbs.

“Is this brute behavior so necessary?” Beryl asked sternly. “You needn't scare him off before he's had a chance to be of use.”

Zagreus rolled his eyes and ignored her. “Where’re you trying to go?” he asked Credence gruffly.

It seemed ill advised to tell the truth, that Credence really was just bored out of his skull. “The, ah, the owlery,” he declared with more confidence than he felt.

The groundskeeper looked at him like he suspected Credence’s intellect. “’s back that way. You missed the entrance.” While Credence wrestled his clumsy tongue for some retort, Zagreus sighed and pulled off his cap, running his hand through the wiry nest of grey hair before fitting it back on with grim purpose. “C'mon then.”

He led—stalked, really—back through the house, careless, familiar strides where Credence fair tiptoed. Going at such a swift, casual manner through the elegant old house both appalled and relieved him. Zagreus moved with a carelessness that made Greythorn less dreamlike. Here, the beautiful parquet was scuffed so terribly even magic couldn’t buff away the marks, and there, the sun streamed in and over-warmed the hall. Zagreus didn’t seem to notice, except to absently sidestep a squealing floorboard or an eager hat stand with as much surety as if retracing the steps of a beloved dance. Credence struggled to keep up, for though he was a bit taller than Zagreus, the old man moved fast. Without much warning, he pulled to a stop in front of a narrow paneled door that Credence had completely missed before, and rattled the reluctant handle until it turned with a rusty sigh.

The owlery was connected to the house by a brief arcade of herringboned brickwork and glass. Here, the windows were smudged with dust, and the door at the end of the walkway stuck a bit too, until Zagreus cursed under his breath and gave it a solid kick, whereupon it swung open complainingly. The air inside was stale and musty, and the lamps along the walls were slow to light, but as Zagreus and Credence climbed the tight spiraling steps to the upper levels, the light grew stronger, and the heavy brick walls gave way to airy open windows and archways.

“The Owlery,” Zagreus said with some irony as they reached the upper platform, a breezy belvedere with high, pitched-roof ceilings. The exposed rafters hung with generous perches and cozy alcoves recessed into the brickwork along the thick columns. The reason for his tone of voice was immediately evident—there was no owl in sight, and the air was still and quiet.

“…are they all out?” Credence asked, but no. It was cold up here, the air blowing freely between the open spaces. No sheltering charms or heating spells, no trace feathers or ammonic odor. Time and the elements had scoured out all traces of life.

“And they probably aren’t coming back. This is no place for them, not anymore,” Zagreus said darkly, leaning against a pillar while Credence slowly walked a circle around the space, peering into the rafters half-heartedly for signs of a stray messenger bird. After a moment, the groundskeeper added, grudgingly, “There’s one or two wild ones that like to nest here. If they do so this year, you can try bribing them to take your letters. They’d like as well shred your parchment to line their nests, though.”

Credence nodded, disheartened. The wind up here was noisy and cold, and he could see the forest path that he had first walked up. And up here, the platform was barely protected by spells, and certainly no railings. It was a long way to the ground. Unbidden, his heart beat a bit faster, and the staticky prickling under his skin twisted uneasily.

“I had been hoping to write to a friend of mine,” Credence said out loud as casually as he was able. “Tina Goldstein? She’s a police—an Auror, in Manhattan. She’s asked me to keep her updated, about my progress. Is there any other way to send word? A- a telegraph office?” There was no reply, except for a soft snort, and Credence flushed hotly, suddenly feeling very silly.

He glanced at Zagreus, who was glaring moodily out at the view. “It’s lovely here,” he tried, and after a moment crossed the owlery to stand next to the groundskeeper.

Zagreus grunted unintelligibly and shifted so that Credence had a better view. The Adirondacks rolled out before them, a wavering carpet of blazing scarlet and gold as far as the eye could see. Not too far from the property, just beyond the tree line was the mirrored surface of the pond, and a mile or so beyond, the clustered roofs and snaking paths that marked a main street. A small town, perhaps, and Credence felt some reassurance that if all else failed, he’d walk into town to send his letters.

“Mr. Reeves,” Credence asked after a moment, “Is it… safe to walk through the woods?”

Zagreus grunted. “Why d’you ask?”

Credence hesitated briefly. “I, that is, Mr. Graves and I were walking about the estate this morning,” and here, Zagreus’ expression darkened briefly, “but when we reached the gate, well…”

“What happened?”

“Nothing. The- the gate didn’t open, and the wind turned violent, so we returned. Also,” Credence added, and stopped. “Also, I- think there is some sort of wild animal in the woods.”

“There’s a lot of wildlife here,” Zagreus said, but a strange tone underlined his words.

“Of course,” Credence murmured.

“What do you think you saw?” Zagreus asked after a brief silence. Credence shrugged.

“I’m not sure—it was half hidden… a large hawk, perhaps?”

Next to him, Zagreus twitched, and straightened from his slouch. His brows beetled fiercely, but he didn’t say a word as he started for the stairs. Credence hurried after him, startled by the abrupt change. They wound back down the stairs at a silent, rapid clip, crossed back into the mansion, and ran up against Mr. Graves at the end of the hallway, smiling faintly at the two of them. Zagreus stopped so suddenly that Credence bounced off his back.

“…Credence,” Mr. Graves said after a prolonged moment. “I was looking for you.”

“S-sorry, Mr. Graves,” Credence managed.

“Thank you, Mr. Reeves. You may go,” Mr. Graves said.

Zagreus rolled his eyes and walked off without further ceremony.

“Thank you,” Credence called after him, but was barely acknowledged.

“A crude bear of a man,” Mr. Graves commented with wry amusement and smiled at Credence. “Well, shall we?”

 

Credence knew he was dreaming because summer was visible in the painted murals, and he’d only ever seen brown and bare tangle of vines where now roses in full bloom spilled against the wall in whorls of red and pink. The poppies were gone from the painted garden—fountains were visible. Warm, golden sunlight suffused the room in rapturous heat, and the mansion felt almost homey. He recognized the green walls and leather furniture and tiled fireplace, as well as the figure across the room, in deep conversation with a portrait. Credence crossed the room with confidence he rarely felt in his waking moments.

The figure turned at the sound of his footsteps, and indeed it was Mr. Graves. He looked much as he had earlier in the day, impeccably attired and postured, but there was no smile or amusement in his face, only lines of exhaustion and worry, and his penetrating dark eyes regarding Credence soberly. For some reason, Credence thought this made him seem more real.

“Mr. Graves,” he said, and it was a dream, so he smiled, wide and bright, like nothing except his own shadow had ever weighed him down. “Hello.”

“Mr. Barebone,” Mr. Graves intoned gravely- ha! Credence thought- and inclined his head minutely. “I can’t tell if you have the best or worst timing of all.”

Credence tipped his head. “What do you mean??”

“Not that I don’t want to help you, but,” Mr. Graves reached out and gripped his shoulder, half heartening, half consolingly. “I can’t even help myself. Y’see?”

And Credence did indeed see—the faint lines that were almost invisible, that just gleamed in the light, they crossed in webs about Mr. Graves’ fingers, the hands, his arm, his head and neck and torso and legs until he resembled the spindle for a dark, ugly thread.

“How do you move?” Credence marveled. He tugged at a thread that crossed Mr. Graves’ wrist and hissed when it tightened, impressing the skin below with a sickly shadow. Mr. Graves bore his curiosity with stoic patience.

“Easily in some ways, and not at all in others,” he shrugged. “But is this where you really need to be?”

“Where else is there?”

Mr. Graves shook his head, so very, very kind and serious. “It’s not safe here for anyone.”

“That’s alright,” Credence replied with a trace of bitterness. “I’m a bit dangerous myself.”

“Sure, maybe,” Mr. Graves said, and humor sparked in his expression, but it didn’t feel malignant and Credence found himself liking the way his mouth tried to suppress its upturn of amusement. “But there’re _real_ monsters out there, kid.”

“Real monsters?” Credence echoed. “Am I not one?”

“No,” Mr. Graves said with such satisfied certainty that Credence almost believed him. In fact, he was so suffused with tender feeling that he almost didn’t notice the dream world around him shredding apart like tissue.

 

The cry was faint, and Credence, still muddled and caught half in that dream encounter, couldn’t parse the sound for what it was immediately. Lying awake, staring into the depths of the canopy overhead, he barely dared to breathe, uncertain if the noise had followed him from sleep or had roused him from it.

There!

Credence sat upright, heart thudding furiously in his chest and wide awake. That was definitely a scream of some sort. He looked about nervously, but everything in his room seemed vaguely sinister, if not particularly threatening at this dark hour. Credence was, by nurture, an incurious soul—Mary Lou had seen to that part of his upbringing quite well. But there was someone screaming in the house. What if it was Mr. Graves who was injured? Or Zagreus? The prickling just under his skin, the sensation that MACUSA examiners had assured him was his magic, crawled and twisted uneasily along his chest and arms.

“Settle,” he instructed himself, which rarely worked. He fidgeted under the covers, his mind spinning with wilder and wilder thoughts until when the second groan of pain came, it was almost a relief. Credence scrambled out of the bedsheets and to his feet. He shivered in the sudden cold, then crossed the room to grab his coat and stuffed his bare feet into his shoes. He headed to his door with determination, but the effect was broken when he was forced to wheel back around for his pine wand, useless as it might be in his hands.

The halls of Greythorn stretched infinitely to either end, their ends wreathed in darkness. Credence peered towards both and thought. The screams had been faint, enough that he thought they might have come from the lower level of the house, and that he might head in the direction of the stairs. Thus decided, he stepped into the hall and raised his wand uncertainly.

“Lumos,” he whispered dubiously, but for once he and his magic were in accordance, somewhat. The tip of his wand flickered and pulsed with a weak blueish light, but it was better than nothing. Credence brandished it before him as he crept towards the stairs. All the warmth of his dreams had long dissipated—the house was too big, too dark, and his unsteady wand light made the shadows twist oddly along the walls. He tucked an arm close around himself as he hurried ahead. At the stairs, he paused. It was tensely silent. Nothing pricked at his ears as he ventured cautiously down the steps, clutching at his wand and the bannister. Where to now? The foyer and the main door faced him—to the right, the parlor and library, to the left the dining room and kitchen. At this hour, it would be unusual if any of these rooms were occupied. Credence swallowed and peered down the corridor of dryads to left, and then quickly straightening up with his wand out as the sound of a door slamming abruptly shattered the silence.

Credence turned and almost smacked into Mr. Graves as he emerged from the corridor.

“S-Sir!” Credence gasped, fetched up against Mr. Graves and gripping his wand too tightly. “Is everything- alright?”

For a brief, startled moment, Mr. Graves stared at Credence with cold shock, his eyes gleaming oddly bright in the wand light and his grip too tight.

“Credence, what are you doing up at this hour?” Mr. Graves said, and his voice was forcibly light and slightly strained.

“I heard something,” Credence explained. “Screaming.”

“Screaming?” Mr. Graves laughed. “Nonsense! Bad dreams, no doubt.”

“I was awake when I heard it,” he insisted, but Mr. Graves was already ushering him back up the stairs.

“Then it must have been something else,” said Mr. Graves decisively. “I was downstairs in the library until just now, and I didn’t hear anything.”

“Oh,” Credence said, reluctantly allowing himself to be shown back to his rooms. “It sounded—awful close.”

“We do get foxes in the woods around here, and their calls are remarkably human-like,” Mr. Graves said. “That must have been it. Ah, you city folk! It takes some getting used to, being surrounded by so much wilderness.”

“Maybe,” Credence agreed politely, and Mr. Graves patted his shoulder with a jovial grin. They were at his bedroom door now, and Mr. Graves seemed intent on seeing Credence back into bed. “Thank you, and I’m- I’m sorry for startling you, just now. I thought someone—you, or Mr. Reeves might have been hurt.”

“Of course, Credence. And your proactivity is commendable,” Mr. Graves agreed, and firmly closed the door.

How can someone be equal parts bewildered and comforted and unsettled? Credence thought with bemusement as he climbed back into his bed. But he supposed Mr. Graves knew what he was saying—there had been black spatters on his sleeve, ink no doubt, that marked him as still working tonight, and surely he knew better than Credence when to be alarmed. Still, the prospect of sleep seemed very far away.

But thankfully, there were no more disruptions that night. Credence’s prediction proved wrong, and he fell into dreamless sleep shortly thereafter and only woke when the curtains drew themselves back around eight.

 


	2. Chapter 2

 The kitchen was already occupied when Credence went down for breakfast. Mr. Graves was standing at over the sink, sleeves rolled up, and turned when Credence stepped through the entry and gave a cry of alarm.

“What is it?” Mr. Graves said sharply, shoulders tensing. Credence, unable to think of words, pointed at the crimson stains along Mr. Graves’ arm and shirt front. “What- oh. No, no. Not blood,” he laughed, and lifted his hands to show muddy brown and red chunks in his palms. “Beets.”

“Oh,” Credence said, then asked dumbly, “Beets?”

Mr. Graves hummed in agreement as he dropped the chunks into a bowl and rinsed his hands off. “I enjoy them roasted.”

“But, won’t the house…” Credence asked, gesturing to mean the magic place settings in the breakfast nook.

“I prefer making my own breakfast; it’s more to my taste. Greythorn’s too old fashioned, I find,” Mr. Graves said with a lopsided smile. “I feel as host, I must make apologies for the shortfalls.”

“It’s really very good,” Credence assured him. “Um. Can I join you for breakfast?”

“Certainly,” Mr. Graves said, and they went and settled in at the breakfast nook, where two place settings were arranged, with a full plate where Credence sat the morning before. Mr. Graves had arranged his own breakfast—a simple affair of the aforementioned beets and dry toast. He refused the coffee for his own dark brew. “Medicine,” he’d shrugged.

As they ate, Credence observed that his dining companion seemed in much better spirits than the night before, and he said so, drawing an elegant raised brow.

“Yes. There were some… setbacks in my work yesterday, but I believe I have had some breakthroughs last night. Am I so obvious?” Mr. Graves smirked, and Credence flushed.

“Only because I observe,” he replied.

Mr. Graves tilted his head and regarded him as if evaluating Credence’s substance with his gimlet eye.

“Why don’t you tell me what you mean to achieve here,” Mr. Graves said after a moment, “and let us see what we shall do.”

Credence picked at the sugared grapefruit with his spoon.  “Ms. Goldstein said she’d gone over the plans with you.”

Waving impatiently, Mr. Graves leaned forward to capture his gaze. “But what is it that you want, Credence,” he intoned seriously. “It is your life, after all.”

His words were so kind, Credence thought. It should have made him speak freely of his- his fears and worries and overall that twisted black anger despair that had landed him here in the first place. But for whatever reason, he only half-smiled back. “I’d like to learn magic, properly,” he said, carefully avoiding mentioning his Obscure condition directly. He did not feel quite strong enough to say it out loud. “To control my abilities and return to the city and be closer to my sister.”

“Your sister, who was also rescued?” Mr. Graves asked. “Tell me about her.”

This was a simple enough topic. Credence approached it with relief, telling him of Modesty, a spirited soul who’d taken to the upending of her childhood upbringing with admirable aplomb. She had been adamant in staying with Credence when they were first taken into MACUSA custody, had lost her voice screaming in protest when they were kept separately while undergoing interrogation and evaluations. By the time they were reunited and under house arrest at the Goldsteins, she had already begun reveling in the wizarding world, gleeful in the face of self-washing dishes and color-changing hats.

Mr. Graves nodded, his gaze intently curious. “And she is nine, you say?”

“Just last month,” Credence confirmed.

“Wonderful,” Mr. Graves murmured, and smiled.

“So, you see, I need to learn magic, so that I can be with her again. Will you help me?”

“It would be my pleasure,’ Mr. Graves promised.

 

Credence was magical—it was difficult to deny his power when the slightest mood change courted a startling display of consequences. Instead of levitating, apples turned purple, or melted, or exploded all over the counter top.  His pine wand had been devilishly difficult to acquire; at the end of the ordeal, the wand maker noted that the pine wand was a good match, but it wasn’t of any use if his magic refused to accept it. Credence rather thought that was a recurring theme in his life.

All this, Credence related to Mr. Graves as they stood in a grand, airy hall on the second level. It was once a ballroom perhaps, with smooth polished wood floors and little furniture. The table before them had been transfigured from a settee from the sitting room in an adjoining suite.

“A twisted puzzle indeed. Why don’t you show me what it is you can do first?” Mr. Graves suggested.

Swallowing apprehensively, Credence brandished the pine wand before him. “Wingardium Leviosa,” he said. Before him on the table, a fountain pen spun in a lazy circle but stayed at the same elevation. “Wingardium leviosa!”

As Credence attempted to levitate the pen, he could feel the numb fizzing along the soft inside of his arms, a livewire of frustrated magic that surged but only seemed to press against the inside of his skin. Nothing happened. Frustrated, he whispered the spell again, aware of Mr. Graves’ intent gaze, and _pushed_.

The black miasma within him shivered; Credence flinched, jerking his wand back. A window at the end of the hall cracked; as they watched, the entire sheet slowly tipped out of its frame and fell inwards, shattering on the floor with a resounding smash.

The pen was still.

Blanching, Credence hardly dared to look at Mr. Graves, but he only cocked his head thoughtfully.

“What are you afraid of, Credence?” Mr. Graves said softly.

“I don’t know,” Credence said, still staring at his scuffed shoes.

Mr. Graves took the pen off the table and admired it a moment before tucking it into his jacket. “Perhaps you should find out. Until then, I don’t know if I can be of help.”

Credence jerked up, dismayed. But before he could protest, they were interrupted by heavy footfalls followed by Zagreus entering the ballroom. He took in the tableau of their table and wands, then the broken glass at the end of the room and scowled.

“What the hell did you do?” Zagreus snapped at Mr. Graves. Credence flinched at the viciousness in his tone, but Mr. Graves didn’t seem perturbed at all.

“Make more work for you, I’m afraid,” Mr. Graves replied with smile. “Credence, I’ve got another matter to attend to, so we shall have to continue this another day.”

“Should I… keep practicing?” Credence asked, desperately hoping Mr. Graves would invite him along.

“I don’t see why not! And you might ask Mr. Reeves his opinion as well. Back in the day,” Mr. Graves added with a smirk, “he was quite the duelist.”

“With pistols?” Credence replied, but Mr. Graves only gave a shout of laughter as he strolled out of the ballroom. Left standing next to the table, Credence twisted the pine wand in his hand and looked sideways at Zagreus Reeves, who was busy ignoring him and scowling at the broken glass.

Well. Credence turned back to the table, and after a moment tugged his handkerchief from his jacket and dropped it on the surface. “Wingardium Leviosa,” he whispered, self-consciously quiet. “Wingardium leviosa. Wingardium leviosa.” The sheet flattened and trembled promisingly on the polished wood.

For a while, it was quiet, only Credence’s mumbles and the scrape of Zagreus’ boots as he contemplated the window. With the sunshine streaming in through the great windows above them, it was peaceful and almost pleasant; the whole ballroom seemed to glow amber.

Zagreus’ footsteps stopped soon though, followed by the sound of a series of bell-like ringing—Credence glanced up just in time to see the broken glass sweep together into flawless diamond panes. Zagreus made a sweeping gesture, but the glass hovered uncertainly as if waiting for further direction. He cursed softly, tugging his cap off and passing a hand over his hair before jamming his hat back on.

The silence was fraught, and Credence hovered on the edge of speaking or fleeing the room. “Is something wrong?” he finally managed.

“It’s fine,” Zagreus snapped too-quickly, then visibly took a deep breath and pulled back his shoulders. “Nothing you can do,” he said, calmer and marginally more polite.

Credence noted awkwardly, “You’re bleeding.”

Zagreus’ sleeves were rolled up but the blood had still managed to smudge the cuffs red. It was spattered over the window glass as well; he must have cut himself.

“I’ll be fine,” Zagreus said, but Credence was already started across the room, crossing in hurried strides.

“It looks deep, Mr. Reeves. Are you sure you’re alright?” Credence stopped a short distance away, just out of reach, his upper half of the body tilted forward but his feet reluctant to follow.

“Yeah.” Up close, the dark purple shadows under Zagreus’ eyes were visible, lines of pain joining those of age that bracketed his mouth. He contemplated the glass before him with a frown, absently bracing his injury with his other hand.

“Should I- is there- help?” Credence managed.

“Nothing you can do,” Zagreus said, and then snapped his fingers after a moment and pointed, “Wait, let me borrow your wand.”

Credence glanced at the pine wand and handed it over. Zagreus took it and tested its grip and weight. First, he pointed it at his arm and murmured a spell. Something like lightning arced from the tip and sank into his skin. Credence jumped, but Zagreus only grunted briefly. The cut, though, closed up into a livid red scar. He flexed his arm gingerly and swished the wand.

“Stand back,” he told Credence, and waited until he had scuttled back a few feet before turning his attention back to the window glass. With a wave of his borrowed wand, the glass jerked off the floor and sailed up, fitting itself back into position with a ringing chime. The glass was barely in place before Zagreus hissed and half-flung the wand at Credence.

Credence nearly fumbled the catch but managed to grab a hold of the tip. “Is everything alright?”

Zagreus examined his palm and flexed his fingers. “That one’s persnickety,” he commented. “Nearly burned my skin off.”

“Oh, uh, is that a thing they do? Wands?” Credence asked, glancing down at the perfectly cool, unremarkable wand in his hand.

“Some,” Zagreus said, straightening up. “Depends on the wand.” He cut a cool, assessing gaze at Credence. “Depends on the wizard.”

Unsure of what that meant, Credence just tucked the pine wand away.

“No more practicing?” Zagreus asked with a bushy raised brow, and Credence flushed.

“It seems foolish, now,” he admitted with a little shrug. A bit demoralizing as well; Mr. Graves seemed to have no interest in teaching him, and his own wand refused to work properly, except when handled by someone else.

Zagreus eyed him long enough to make him nervous, then sighed violently. “Well you aren’t allowed to kick your heels around here,” he said, and began heading for the door. “What’re you waiting for, the train?” Zagreus demanded when Credence remained where he stood, bewildered. “Come on.”

Credence thought about ignoring him and returning to his room to mope until he dissolved into the Obscurus out of sheer despondency and boredom. He swallowed and followed Zagreus from the ballroom.

 

“Ho, there!” Beryl shouted jovially as Zagreus opened the double-doors to a sitting room. He crossed the room and tied the curtains back, revealing tall windows; sunlight made the room glow, with its high ceilings and butter-yellow walls, gilded with gold borders. “It has been an age since anyone’s been here.” She had wandered into one of the large, framed landscapes that decorated the walls, waving cheerfully at the young lad and lasses herding winged cows in the sylvan distance.

Zagreus ignored her, and motioned Credence inside. “The old solarium is a good room to start.”

“Start what?” Credence asked, head tilted up to see the murals above.

The groundskeeper slapped his arm with a notepad and tossed a pen at him. “Inventory,” he proclaimed with grim satisfaction. “The house is being sold, and the furniture with it. I need to know exactly what’s included with that, and you have nothing better to do. You can write, right?”

“Yes, sir,” Credence agreed.

“Alright. Item one, pair of fancy-painted satinwood side chairs, red satin upholstery. Second item, fold-out satinwood side table with checker-pattern marquetry…”

Credence hastily scribbled down the items as Zagreus moved through the room, gently handling each item. Together, they noted the furniture, then the decorative objects—a rococo antique clock that looked half-swallowed by bronze flora and skittered away from Zagreus’ hands, a game table with a chessboard inlaid into the surface with dragon scales, some perfectly ordinary table lamps.

“Tiffany,” Zagreus pronounced, brushing off the dust from the stained-glass dragonfly that decorated the shade. “A pair, and if possible, should be kept together.”

Credence nodded and trailed him as Zagreus headed to the next room over. It was an undemanding task, at least for Credence, the sort of head-down, mindless busy work that he’d done for Mary Lou; mostly it was just a relief to have something to do. And Zagreus was a rough old grump, with a militant impatience about him that spoke of overseeing a platoon of gardeners rather than just the makeshift errand boy he had in Credence. It was clear that Zagreus had been with the house for ages—he never hesitated, his movements spoke of long familiarity with the surroundings. His focus was so entirely on his task that Credence knew it was purposeful. It stung, but not in any articulable way.

Beryl was less standoffish however, and followed them from room to room, chatting to Credence with a sunny cheer. It was from her that Credence learned about the non-magical origins of Greythorn, when it was the summer home for a wealthy No-Maj ship captain and his family. His granddaughter turned out to be latent witch, and when she inherited the estate, began sinking magic into the foundations. By the time the property fell to the Graveses, magical renovations had made Greythorn a proper, if atypical wizarding holding.

“It’s a steady old place if a bit primitive in some respects,” Beryl said fondly. “You can only do so much with a house when you aren’t starting from the foundations, you know? It took a lot of blood and sweat and tears—literally!—to bring it this far. Brightened up considerably once it removed from the Greythorns—shortly after old Cadfan Graves won it. These places take after their owner, and I’m afraid the Greythorns were no peacocks, mostly. By the time Percy’s father, Howell, was born, it was splendid, however. Plenty of character, the Graveses. Do you like gardens, Credence?”

“Very much,” Credence said, which wasn’t exactly a lie. He’d read about many of them— Eden, Babylon. And public parks were sort of like gardens.

“Well, Howell was a gardener _nonpareil_ , you know. That’s why this one’s so unfazed by the muck and mud,” she said with a meaningful look at Zagreus.

“Don’t you ever shut up,” Zagreus snapped from where he was examining a bronze candle stand.

“Well, if you won’t talk to the boy, who else will tell him these things?” Beryl pointed out reasonably.

“He’s miserable enough as it is, and you think lecturing him about ancient history is better?” Zagreus said testily, his frown carved deep into his face.

“I don’t mind,” Credence said. “It’s interesting.”

“She’s a portrait, you can’t hurt her feelings,” Zagreus told him.

“I see nothing has changed,” Beryl said freezingly. “You’ve always been a miserable child.”

“So you grew up here, Mr. Reeves?” Credence cut in hastily. Beryl opened her mouth then huffed, snapped her jaw shut, and strode out of the frame, nose in the air. “Did you know Mr. Graves as a boy?”

Zagreus set the candlestick down with a sharp thunk. “Something like that.” He turned his attention to a miniature ebony display cabinet set on the table. It was a lovely, delicate work with painted panels and gemstones set into its surfaces, and its latch seemed to be stuck fast.

Credence ventured closer. “What was the family like?”

The cabinet seemed to have sharp edges—Zagreus jerked his hand back but didn’t curse when a ragged tear on his finger began bleeding sluggishly. Credence made a distressed noise, but Zagreus waved him away impatiently.

“I’m fine, doesn’t hurt,” he said, glaring at the cabinet.

“I’m distracting you,” Credence said.

“You’re fine,” Zagreus shot back, then steadied himself with a long breath, and the silence that breathed between them felt strangely less tense. “The Graveses were a bunch of rich pompous assholes, all of them. They thought they were better than the rest of New York for no good reason, and now they’re almost all gone, which just goes to show you what good pride does you.”

“Mr. Reeves,” Credence protested, but Zagreus just leveled his dark, furious gaze at him, except there was a measure of melancholy in his eyes now.

“Maybe a long time ago, this place would’ve been able to help you, but now,” Zagreus scoffed, and a bitter, strange smirk flashed across his weathered face. “Percival Graves can barely help himself.”

He looked so odd that Credence leaned closer, one hand resting atop the cabinet. “But there’s hope, isn’t there? If- if things have changed so terribly, perhaps it could go another way as well, when you least expect it?” As it had for him and Modesty—great, and terrible, and awesome change.

Zagreus eyed him for a long time, and then his gaze slid down to the cabinet. As Credence withdrew his hand, Zagreus tugged on the handle again and the front swung open with nary a sound. Inside were several tiny drawers, inlaid with marble and pewter and chased bronze frames. Credence caught a whiff of- of something like ozone and petrichor, the scent of magic concentrated, and heard the impression of hundreds of fluttering wings, and had to blink away the urge to sneeze. After a moment of contemplation, Zagreus gently pushed the cabinet closed again. When the latched clicked into place, Credence felt his breath finally loose from his chest., glanced up to see Zagreus looking at him with a strange, thoughtful expression. He didn’t say anything though, except to tell Credence to note it in his list.

 

 

They had only gone through the three rooms at the end of the East Wing, but Zagreus dismissed Credence, shooing him off to lunch while stamped off out into the ground, grumbling about maintenance. Credence waited in the kitchen where a potato stew sat bubbling on the stove, links of roasting sausage in the cast iron pan sizzling away besides it. Mr. Graves didn’t appear, and so finally, Credence ladled the stew and sausage into a bowl and took it to the sunny breakfast room to eat alone.

After lunch, there was not much for Credence to do. He had hoped to assist Mr. Graves in organizing his correspondence or research, or whatever an Auror and venerated MACUSA statesman needed assistance with, but that did not seem likely. Queenie had whispered to him of Mr. Graves’ heroic turn in a European affair, battling some wizard with a vaguely Germanic name, and lingering war fatigue, in addition to other personal matters, had caused him to abruptly retreat to the countryside. He had originally asked for two weeks but had been gone for nearly three times that, almost the entirety of the sad Barebone affair. The president was furious but to hear the Goldsteins tell it, Percival Graves had not taken any time off of work for nearly fifteen years, and there was little Picquery could do about it.

The afternoon passed in hollow silence. Credence wandered a little more into the manor, glimpsing odd little corridors and doors that wavered at the corner of his view and disappeared when he turned towards them. At one point, he found himself facing the green study again, and peered inside, hoping to find Beryl in her frame, but it was empty except for the black velvet curtain and oaken table spread over with maps and a yellowed globe. The other portraits only tracked his movements with impassive, distantly curious gazes. They were all dark haired and dark eyed, varying in age and gender, but undoubtedly of a family; many of them were marked with Mr. Graves’ thick black brows and strong jawline. One small frame contained a young teenager with black curls with a hidden face—he didn’t even bother to glance at Credence, absorbed as he was in a book.

Credence found the portraits more unsettling than anything and retreated to the library where the books fluttered and shifted along the shelves but were by and large placid enough to handle and read. He stayed there with a volume on a history of magical Latin America until startled by a pointed throat clearing—a portrait of a dour looking matron he’d taken to be an ordinary painting waited for him to meet her eyes to pronounce “Dinner” with due gravitas.  Credence flushed and scrambled to his feet, accidentally shoving the armchair back with a screech in his haste and incurring a pained look from the portrait.

“My goodness, child,” the woman admonished, and her tone was surprisingly mild. “A little decorum, please.” He ducked sheepishly and she waved him off languidly with a black lace handkerchief.

At dinner, the table was set once again with exuberant extravagance; a roast leg of lamb with mint jelly and stuffed Cornish hens today. Mr. Graves appeared at the dinner hour, asked after his day politely, and focused on his hen with single-minded appreciation. When Credence asked him in return how his afternoon had gone, Mr. Graves smiled.

“Productively, I have reason to hope. And then I think we shall have much more to do.”

Credence waited for elaboration, but when none was forthcoming, gave up that avenue of conversation. “Mr. Graves, is there a way to send a letter? I’d promised to send note of my arrival to my sister.”

Mr. Graves didn’t set down his fork, but he did pause and consider him keenly. “There aren’t owls here at the moment, and the Floo hasn’t been linked to the system for several years.”

“I figured, after asking Mr. Reeves,” Credence admitted. “But, perhaps, the town should have a post office, or a- a Western Union? I could send a telegram.”

“Ah, the… No-Maj way,” Mr. Graves said with a fleeting curl of disgust. “It is best to avoid town. They are not keen on strangers.”

“I don’t mind,” Credence said.

“You’re welcome to try, butit’s a wasted effort, trust me.” Mr. Graves waved dismissively. “Now, tell me about your sister, Credence.”

 

 

The next morning, Credence tucked a hunk of bread and an apple from the kitchen into his pockets and ventured out of the back of the house. Mr. Graves might sneer, but he hadn’t outright disapproved, and Credence did want to let the Goldsteins and his sister know he was well. The breeze susurrated through the quickly baring branches overhead, cheerfully plucking at his coat tails as he followed the flagstone path that led out the back of the house and down towards the woods. Over in the distance was the sound of rhythmic rustling and crashing. Along the eastern wall, Zagreus was clearing the dead vines that had crept wild up the side and over the windows.

“Credence,” Zagreus said, and Credence hurried over to the foot of the ladder.

“Mr. Reeves, I’m going into town,” he said. “Would you like me to bring you back something?”

Zagreus tugged a work glove off his hand and wiped his face, then stamped down the ladder. His white-gray hair was stuck flat to his face with sweat, and there were deep, purple bruises of exhaustion under his eyes but he still moved purposefully, tucking the gloves into his coat pocket. “I’ll walk you down to the path,” he said, and headed off, leaving Credence scrambling to catch up.

The day was crisp—although the sun was bright, it did little against the bite in the air. Along the wooded path that wound past the mirror-bright pond, leaves had drifted into thick, crackling layers; even the maintained path was covered with a thin spread of foliage. Credence snuck glances at Zagreus from under the brim of his hat every so often, half-perplexed, half-grateful for his company.

“Your letters,” Zagreus said, and Credence nearly jumped in surprise. “Are they sealed yet?”

“Not yet—I thought to buy a card or ribbon for Modesty—my sister—in town, before mailing,” Credence said. He glanced at Zagreus and noted the flash of grim satisfaction.

“If you expect to receive a reply, it may help to have them include this in their return,” Zagreus told him, and rummaged in his coat pocket. They were on a slight decline now, and Credence fell back as he maneuvered slowly in his thin-soled shoes. Ahead of him, Zagreus slowed down, almost absently, to keep better pace with him. When the path leveled back out, he held out a pressed flower—a poppy, that deep red-orange shade of a low-burning fire, still vibrant though it was paper thin and felt insubstantial. “From the front garden. It’s been years since owls flew out this way, but this should help.”

“Thank you,” Credence said, and carefully tucked the bloom into the envelope. Ahead of them, the path was winnowing down to a narrow turn, wide enough for one only figure at a time. An iron post and gate was growing visible, and Zagreus slowed his steps.

“You’re writing to Tina Goldstein, yes?” he asked, strangely hesitant, and Credence turned to him, pausing.

“Yes?”

Zagreus nodded curtly. “Send her my regards,” he said, and there was something meaningful in his words that Credence couldn’t understand, so he nodded and promised to do so, and almost tumbled out of the gate when it swung open at his bare touch.

Credence had a moment to catch his balance and straighten before the gate swung shut again, and Zagreus and the path blinked out of sight. He paused and took a moment to smooth down his coat, glanced around nervously; there was nothing around him, however, except for the beating of feathers and the rustle of branches overhead as a bird took flight; its feathers flashed golden in the weak sunlight. Shaking his head, Credence turned and continued down the straight, dirt path, only half a mile in the same direction until it led to the edge of town.

 

There was not much of a main street—a few restaurants and a gas station flanked a two-lane road that catered mostly to holiday-goers passing through, while the post office shared dominion with the Western Union office.

Credence headed into the grocery and chose a small card of a pretty lakeside for Modesty. He marveled at the assortment of sweets and mundane dry goods, contemplated the ordinary, non-magical newspaper with a misty sort of thrill, and was so pleasant to the grocer that he was regarded with wary suspicion until he left the premises. At the post office, he borrowed a pen to complete his letter and add the instructions for the dried poppy before sealing the envelope and addressing it to Tina, hoping that the Woolworth address would be sufficient to reach her. Then he wandered down the small main street, noting the luncheonette on the corner and the busy gas station. There weren’t many people on the streets, which suited Credence just fine—he missed the mad rush and anonymity of the city, and the curious stares of the townsfolk were too abrasive after so long in relative isolation. Credence had no automobile or horse for that matter, was not dressed for the outdoors, and had no companion but himself. He attempted to smile and nod at those he passed, but eventually felt so uncomfortably alien that after he had walked the full length of the main town, he turned back towards Greythorn, both dread and relief prickling him as he crossed into the woods.

 

And so, Credence’s first week in strange exile passed. Late afternoons, if Credence was not outside or in his room attempting spell work, he browsed the library, which was the loveliest room in Greythorn. There were two levels of books, and enormous windows against which cushions were fashioned so that one could read against warm sunlight. A long, heavy desk ran down the center of the ground level, with bell-shaped reading lights that unfurled when one sat down, and the floors were thickly carpeted in soft, dark crimson rugs. Over the doorway was a carved facsimile of a strange creature with a lovely womanly face and wings and feathers, something from the Greek classics and in line with the respectable collection it housed. Even though Credence hadn’t often read for pleasure in the past, he found himself growing a taste for it here. The shelves were stocked with magical tomes and dusty old histories, but also wizarding novels and illustrated storybooks. In another corner, Credence even found a decent stock of No-Maj philosophical writings—de Tocqueville and Hobbes and Thucydides.

Dinner was marked when the lights flickered—they would not stop until Credence had put aside whatever his occupation and headed into the dining room, where every night, an elaborate meal was ready, Mr. Graves at the top of the table. They ate, made light conversation while Credence tried not to think about how much of the food went untouched, and sometimes Zagreus stomped up on his uneven gait and swiped an entire casserole dish with a glare at Mr. Graves before retreating to wherever he was quartered. Mr. Graves rarely seemed upset though; he chuckled and quirked his eyebrow, as if inviting Credence in on some superior jest. Credence found Mr. Graves’ condescending indulgence towards the irascible groundskeeper even more confounding.

At night, the house closed up dark and tight. No more screams ever woke him, though the second night Credence had lain in bed, jolting awake with every creak and whistle of the wind outside. Mostly he slept—and he was beginning to acquire a sinful fondness for good, long, warm sleep, interrupted only by morning light and his own desire for waking.

And if, at night he sometimes dreamed of a quieter, warmer Mr. Graves, well, that wasn’t anyone's business but his own.

 

 

Tapping on the window glass roused Credence from where he drowsed against the cushions. He blinked and peered through the warped glass, and after a moment made out the rough shape and coloring of Sierra, a large horned owl that served the Woolworth building. She was Tina’s favorite, and therefore Credence's as well, and he grinned at the sight of her.

Leaving the library, he ducked into the kitchen for a leftover biscuit and rushed up the owlery stairs two steps at a time.

“Hello,” he greeted, a mite breathlessly when he reached the platform. Sierra was perched in one of the lower alcoves. She shrieked her displeasure that the basic comforts most owleries offered were missing but haughtily allowed him to carefully stroke her head.  Credence gently detached the letter from her leg and dropped the biscuit before her. He thought about attempting Aguamenti in an old water dish bolted to the wall but recalled how he'd melted a teapot to sludge that morning and decided that Sierra had a whole pond just past the tree line. Inside, the letter unfolded and dropped the dried poppy blossom into his hands. He slipped it into his pocket and scanned the letter eagerly.

 

_Dear Credence,_

_I'm so glad to hear from you. I've never been to Greythorn myself, but it is one of those historic old places that will someday house a museum perhaps.  Director Graves never talked about it much, but he often went back there on long weekends, so he must be fond of it. That's what Queenie says, and she's better at these people thoughts, even without the Legilimency. It is odd about the owls though—I know the director had at least one he kept at his townhouse. Perhaps he had not intended to stay so long._

_How are the lessons? From my own experiences, I can tell you the director was pretty tough to impress. I still quake at the memory of our qualifying trials—he had us running the Gantlet with our wands, without our wands, and then without magic at all. When you come back, I will take you to see the training grounds, and you will understand why it’s still the subject of many nightmares! But the director knows what he is doing, and he's tough, but fair. As long as you're sincere, he's got all the patience for you, so don't let his gruff appearance intimidate you!_

_Modesty sends her love—she is doing well in her class and taking to her magical surroundings like a kneazle to milk. Though she only began lessons recently, she’s doing well, and even better, than some of her peers who grew up here. Her instructor, Ms. Lazenbee started them on training wands last week; your sister was the first to master levitation, and I’m afraid the power has gone to her head; she’s been begging Queenie every evening to let her levitate everything she could think of—the salt canister, a crumpled candy wrapper, the chaise with yours truly napping on the arm._

_We took her out over the weekend to see the Sixth Boro, the heart of magical New York. She bought a tin of humming bugs to share with her new friends and also a coin bank so that she can save her pennies to buy you an entire two scoops of Wampus Walnut ice cream when you come back._

_I was surprised at hearing of Zagreus—mostly as I can’t quite place him in my memories, although the name strikes me as oddly familiar; it sounds like an older family name. Must have met him in some context in the past and forgotten; I expect Queenie might remember, as she’s always been better with names and faces. I shall ask you to convey my best wishes in return, and none of my poor recollection._

_I wish I could post Sierra to you, but I expect she's already antsy for home. Still, I shall do my best to send her to you again soon. Perhaps you had better include the poppy blossom again when you post your reply—Modesty had thought to keep the blossom as memento, but Sierra couldn’t seem to grasp the right direction. The misdirection spells on that place must be awful strong._

_Take care, Credence._

_Tina Goldstein_

Credence considered the letter, then looked up. “Will you stay a little? I’d like to post a reply.” Sierra hooted softly and settled into the alcove in a slowly expanding mass of feathers and blinked her eyes shut. He leapt down the stairs, hand on the spiraling rail to keep himself upright, and darted to his room. He’d unpacked the stationary set Queenie had given him but hadn’t used it much. Now he shook out a fresh sheet of paper and a pen and scrawled out a reply, writing tightly and rapidly. After tucking it into the self-sealing envelope and signing the address over the front, Credence grabbed his coin purse hurried back up to the Owlery.

But he skidded to a stop in confusion once he arrived, glancing about in confusion. The alcove was empty—no signs of Sierra remained, except for a few stray crumbs. Credence walked a circle around the open platform, and stared out at the trees, straining for a glimpse of the bird, but there was nothing to see. Consternation and frustration roiled in his breast, and he cursed himself for not writing the letter earlier, or simply scribbling some note out directly on Tina’s letter. MACUSA owls were generally impatient creatures, but Sierra wasn’t the nervous sort – on the contrary she enjoyed brief naps in between jobs, no matter the distance. Perhaps she was recalled urgently, he decided glumly. He glanced at the letter and sighed, stuffed it back in his pocket and went downstairs.

Mr. Graves was in the library when he returned. He smiled, teeth hidden behind a mild curve.

“Hard at work, Credence?” he asked, a fairly ironical cast to his tone. Credence flushed—the tome opened on the window seat radiated affected innocence, but in fact was the sort of book that Mary Lou would have whipped him for even touching.

“I- found it, sir,” he said, and Mr. Graves chuckled.

“Oh, don’t look so scared, Credence. Young folk should read as much as they can—anything, and everything. Though I think you might do better than Oscar Wilde. _The Picture of Dorian Grey_?” Mr. Graves sucked his teeth. “Muggle writers and their clumsy moralizing. Allegories are the best they can do, when it comes to depicting magic; they might have imagination, but it’s unsubtle, isn’t it? There’s no use in reading this tripe, my boy.”

“Muggle, sir?”

Mr. Graves tossed the book back on the window cushions and strolled forward. “It’s what the British call No-Majes. Forgive me, I have been corresponding with my European colleagues all morning. But enough of that, come, let’s talk! I think I have been terribly neglectful of you. Shall we take tea in the conservatory?” He clapped Credence by the shoulder, a hint of force in his touch and Credence, eager to please him, allowed himself to be carried along in this manner. As always in Mr. Graves’ presence, there was a twisting complex of emotions—pleasure, reveling in his attention, and anxiousness, a fear of disappointing him or worse, subjected to scorn.

In the conservatory, tea was steaming gently on the sideboard, alongside a platter of cookies and cucumber sandwiches. Credence sat at the edge of his seat and nibbled politely at some shortbread.

Mr. Graves sat down across from him on the spindly side chair and poured the tea for Credence, and some darky murky potion from his flask for himself. “So, my boy, how are you doing? It has been a week, no? A little more?”

“Almost ten days, sir,” Credence confirmed.

“And how do you find it here?”

Credence returned his smile tentatively as he organized his thoughts. “Well, it’s a beautiful home you have.”

“Thank you,” Mr. Graves replied with amusement. “But you needn’t be concerned with my feelings. Please, tell me your honest thoughts. How do you like it here, truly?”

Most times, when people asked you to be honest with them, they were really begging to be lied to, in Credence’s experience. “I… like it far more than I had hoped,” he said after another moment. “It’s quiet and peaceful, and I don’t… I feel calmer here. But I only wish it were easier to- to correspond with others, sir. There aren’t any owls in the Owlery, and the walk into town is very nice, but long, and I- if I’m still here when it snows…” He trailed off, noting the change in Mr. Graves’ face.

“You went into town?” Mr. Graves asked without any particular expression. Credence jerked his head up at that and nodded nervously.

“I- Yes. Just to send a letter to Ms. Goldstein to let her know I’d reached Greythorn safely.”

“And she’s written back? What news?” Mr. Graves asked.

“Modesty is starting school, mostly,” Credence said.

Mr. Graves’ brows darkened and he spoke sharply. “Surely not a No-Maj school?”

Credence blinked. “Oh, no. They’re sending her to a day school for MACUSA worker’s children.”

Across from him, Mr. Graves’ eyebrows rose. “And… they let her?”

“She’s already caught up, mostly,” Credence admitted proudly. “She’s doing _magic_. Proper _magic._ ” It was something that still tripped his tongue when saying out loud, made his heart beat faster. He smiled.

But Mr. Graves only watched him with a strangely measuring stare and took a ruminative sip from his cup. “I see. That is… excellent news, Credence. You shouldn’t go down there,” he said abruptly. “It’s a No-Maj town, and they don’t like strangers.”

“Oh, I,” Credence said, shrinking back a bit. “I don’t think anyone thought anything of it. I’m- I was No Maj myself-”

Mr. Graves slapped the table firmly enough that Credence flinched. Mr. Graves saw his reaction and his expression softened. “Nonsense, Credence. You were never a No-Maj. Perhaps you were lost from our world for a while, but don’t think for one second you were on a level with them. Those poor souls are as blind and helpless as flobberworms crawling in the dirt.”

Credence realized with cautious warmth that the anger wasn’t directed at him. Mr. Graves was angry on _his behalf_ , and oh, that was- that was nice enough that he almost missed what else was said.

“—even if you are a Squib.”

“Sorry?” said Credence after a lengthy pause.

Mr. Graves leaned forward, looking very sympathetic and earnest. “A Squib, Credence? Someone born to magical lineages, but unable to perform magic.”

The world tilted on its side.

“Oh,” Credence said, grasping for words. “I thought--”

“Yes, you’ve exhibited signs of magic, but no control. That is a possible characteristic of Squibness. Oh, I see I’ve made you upset. Please don’t—you are still of this world, my boy. You belong here, in this magical world. It’s only… harder for you to—”

Mr. Graves broke off and smiled encouragingly. “Won’t you drink your tea?”

Credence’s hand shook so much the tea slopped over the cup and soaked his shirt cuff. Mr. Graves watched him keenly, his dark eyes gleaming. He took the cup and saucer from Credence’s hands gently and set it on the table while Credence could only stare.

“How do you feel, Credence?” he asked solicitously.

Like a blank whiteness had just descended over his world and stuffed his ears with cotton. “I’m alright, thanks,” Credence said numbly.

Mr. Graves looked concerned. “I think I’ve given you a severe shock, which I certainly didn’t want to do. Would you like to talk about it?”

“No,” Credence said, adding mechanically, “Thank you.”

Mr. Graves reached out and cupped his cheek with one large, shockingly warm hand. “Please, don’t hesitate to come find me when you would like to speak about it. Is there anything else I can do?”

Credence stared and blinked slowly. “I—oh, I’d still like to send letters to Ms. Goldstein. She has the care of my sister,” he said.

“I’ll take care of it,” Mr. Graves said, and plucked the slightly crumpled letter from his hands and vanished it into thin air. “Don’t worry, my boy. Perhaps you should rest—you’re still terribly pale. Have another biscuit.”

“Thank you,” Credence echoed, and ate another cookie. It tasted of dust.

 

That night at dinner, faced with a massive lobster Rockefeller on a silver platter chased with winging birds and twining blooms, Credence took his plate into the breakfast room, unable to bear sitting alone in that monstrously extravagant setting. Mr. Graves was absent, having opted to take his dinner in his office, and so Credence picked at his plate and thought with dismal humor that Mary Lou would be proud by how horribly she’d ruined him for any sort of material pleasure. Of course, the amount of outrage and horror she’d have about just everything else would have made up for it.

He wasn’t hungry, but he ate the too-rich food anyways, even though it would certainly make him sick later. In those early days after he’d gone with the MACUSA Aurors, too shocked and numb with strange grief to put up much fight, even the basic meals they’d given him had overwhelmed him. His first two days in the detention room was spent sweating and shivering as his innards cramped and protested. They’d had to change his diet to plain oatmeal and toast and rich broths for the rest of the week; in his more cynical moments, Credence thought that was perhaps for the best, for the doctors and guards on duty began regarding him with sympathy in their eyes, rather than banked fear. Once Tina received clearance to bring Modesty for visits, the wariness disappeared almost completely, and the prognosis on his fate tilted upwards as his uplifted moods were duly noted. Modesty didn’t fear him, not like the others at least. She feared the Obscurus, but perhaps her youth, or her naturally buoyant personality did not allow her to confuse it with Credence himself. Although Modesty couldn’t have done it on purpose, her determination in treating him as ordinary had done much to secure his relatively light sentence. He knew he had to feel grateful, that he wasn’t sunk into oblivion in the notorious Death Cell, or chained and drugged in some tiny prison below the Woolworth, and he _was_. Only, wasn’t this strange half-imprisonment just about the same?

“Got more of that?” someone asked and Credence jerked his head up to see Zagreus in the doorway, tired and grizzled and damp from the rain. Credence nodded and inclined his head towards the dining room. The groundskeeper disappeared and returned a few minutes later with a plate stacked high with food. They ate silently across from each other—Zagreus looked almost too tired to swallow. Still, the mere proximity to another person was enough to gladden Credence’s heart, and though the old man made him nervous, he felt kindly towards him.

“Busy day?” Credence asked.

Zagreus grunted. “Bastard’s got me running the house spells all day and all night.” He squinted at Credence. “I saw an owl fly in earlier. ‘S from the city?”

Credence brightened. “Oh—yes, from Ms. Goldstein. Seems like the owls are having some trouble finding their way in, but the flower helped. Thank you for that suggestion.”

Zagreus nodded noncommittally and shoved another forkful into his mouth. “Did she say anything about Graves?”

“A little bit,” Credence shrugged. “She seems to like him though.”

Zagreus made a rude noise. “She’s too kind,” he said with an odd dryness. Uncomfortable, Credence picked at the remains on his plate.

“Mr. Reeves, you’ve been here a long time, right?” he asked after the silence had stretched for several minutes.

“Long enough.” The shrug and continued focus on his plate made it clear his relative indifference to the question.

Without looking at him directly, Credence set his fork aside. “What- what was it like? As a, that is, when there were people here?”

Zagreus looked at him with a raised brow. “You mean besides the three of us?”

Cheeks hot and overtaken by regret, Credence shrugged. “Never mind.” He picked up his plate and was about to stand when Zagreus spoke.

“Blackberries grow wild, up on the western edge of the dell. A whole wall of them. You’d go with a basket and come back with nothing in ‘em because you’d end up eating them all on the way back. They’d get the grandkids to go on the weekends, and whatever made it back to the kitchen, Nana Graves baked into cake or churned to ice cream. She never used cooking spells; said that magic left a funny aftertaste in her mouth, so she cooked the No-Maj way.” Zagreus grinned briefly. “She’d hate what this kitchen is doing.” The plates rattled, as if overhearing him and disapproving.

“It’s probably for the best. I’m terrible in the kitchen,” Credence admitted shyly. “At the church, Chastity did most the cooking, and Mary Lou, if she had to. She said I’m inclined to oversalt the porridge.”

Zagreus made a face. “Can’t imagine porridge being improved by any amount of salt. This Barebone woman, she ever have anything nice to say, or would she’ve immediately burst into flames?”

A little burp of laughter took Credence by surprise. “Ma was- she could be kind, sometimes.” He flexed his hand. “More often before I… before the magic.” Because it _had_ leaked out, when he was still young, eight or nine and fearlessly childish. A second bread roll when he was hungry, and massive holes in the pinching shoes he hated. Not outright proof, but enough that Mary Lou became not only distant, but hostile. Wary.

“Your real mother. They ever track her down?” Zagreus asked.

Credence shrugged. “No. They think she died in a No-Maj hospital, and there’s no one who has the time or skills to track it down. I don’t remember her.”

“I’m sorry,” Zagreus said quietly.

“For what?” Credence said.

Sighing, Zagreus dropped the topic.

“What about Mr. Graves’ parents?” Credence asked after a moment. “Were they… good people?”

“Good enough, no better or worse than the next pair,” Zagreus said, but he sounded fond so they must have been. “Howell was part of the judiciary and worked well past dinnertime, most nights. Amaryllis was the director of the Auror training program, so she didn’t work much less either. I saw them enough, but less than other- other house staff might.”

“But Beryl said Howell designed the landscape here?”

“Some part of it. He was a respectable amateur horticulturalist. Used the conservatory as a greenhouse, which drove his wife up the wall. She was a bird fancier herself, Caladrian doves mostly, but also owls; was a member of HORUS—the Hudson Owl Racing Union Society. There was a harpy nest in the woods she cared for as well; descendants of, I think, Peregrine Graves’ mating pair from Panama.”

“They must have spent a lot of time here,” Credence said.

“Not as much as they liked, I think,” Zagreus shrugged. “And when they did, I’m not sure they truly appreciated what this place could be.”

“What is that?”

Zagreus scraped the last mouthful of food into his mouth and stood. “An ally,” he said with a quirk of his mouth.

The kitchen fell quiet again as he dumped his plate in the sink to be washed and dried, and clomped off into the house, footsteps muffled against the carpeting. With little else to be done that night, Credence followed suit after dragging the tines of his fork through the dredges of sauce on his plate, mulling over Zagreus’ answer. By the time he’d dressed and washed for bed, he still wasn’t sure but thought that perhaps it meant the house had potential to be helpful. But how? And more importantly, for what purpose?

Credence drifted off in between thoughts. His sleep was troubled again by strange, mournful sounds that night—the wind, or perhaps, the harpies deep in the woods.

 

 

No lessons in the morning, no work to be done, no letters to send, and outside the autumnal glory of the woods had passed after a series of storms and the branches shivered bare in the biting cold, awaiting their snow-white winter dress.

As the days passed, Credence began to learn the strange idiosyncrasies of the manor along with its inhabitants. Mr. Graves rarely left the house, and Zagreus preferred to be out of it. He was instantly recognizable in his gray flannel trousers and hardy wool coat and the flat cap, pushing along wheelbarrows, digging into the empty vegetable garden, staking tarps over the woodpile… Credence once spotted him on the roof, clearing out the drain with what must have been wandless magic – he gestured in sharp, economic motions and the tangle of leaves and twigs and other detritus rose in an undulating line from the drains and gently made for the compost pile. Credence found tears in his eyes watching him, a thick knot of envy and despair that was solid enough to choke on and turned away.

Out of pure boredom, Credence continued the inventory list, wandering through the rooms in turn, noting faithfully the number of armchairs and candlesticks and odd magical artefact in each room. Most were still closed up, but they brightened as he entered them, and the portraits, though largely silent, seemed more curious than hostile as he passed through. Beryl was always willing to stop and chat, but their conversations were always brief, and frustratingly elliptical; he found that she was at her most lucid when talking about the house, of which she was thoroughly an expert. It was a lonely time; Mr. Graves showed little interest in his work and Zagreus only shrugged.

“You have it well in hand,” he’d said when Credence had showed him his notes. “This is fine. You can continue upstairs once you’ve reached the parlor.”

 

Even at her cruelest, Mary Lou hadn’t isolated Credence. Now, the loneliness and despair were crushing. There was nothing to distract from the fact that he sometimes went entire days without seeing anyone else—dinner now, too, was sometimes eaten alone at the breakfast table, the great oak table too daunting for a single diner, with the servings laughably out of proportion and of a strange and too-fine caliber. Credence was sick with it—he missed hot dogs, roasted chestnuts, and the rotten black tar they called coffee from the grocers on Pike and East Broadway.

And the house—oh, the house! The great, lofted ceilings and magnificent brick fireplaces, and the soft beds and polished woods… beautiful trappings in a beautiful prison, hung with dust and cobwebs and Credence half wished his unpredictable magical problem would run riot down the paneled hallways, if only so he’d distract himself from this suffocating fear that he might never leave.

The dreams were worse when they came, because Greythorn was _lovely_ in his dreams. At night, he strolled through the rooms, each open and bright, not a dust cover in sight and the light warm and butter-yellow, making the polished wood paneling on the walls glow golden. And Mr. Graves, in a shirt that wasn’t perfectly pressed and tucked into trousers of old olive-brown serge, walked alongside him. Sometimes they talked—of everything Credence could possibly think of—but other nights, they walked companionably through the halls in silence, Mr. Graves with his hands in his pocket and Credence with his shoulders back and loose. And when Mr. Graves caught him staring as they crossed the gleaming amber ballroom or climbed out over the second-floor balcony onto the roof to stare across a brilliant summer afternoon, he would grin and drop an arm around Credence’s shoulders, effortlessly intimate.

"Don't you like this old place?" he'd ask.

Credence would nod, because in his dreams, he did.

He woke up every morning with an ache in him that only worsened when he sat across from the real Mr. Graves, smiling, perfectly smooth, and utterly aloof.  The dreams had to stop, else he would lose his mind.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

 For the most part of his unhappy life, Credence had been an obedient child. He barely remembered his time before Mary Lou brought him in, but he must have been mildly treated, for painful shock and resentment for his new mother was still impressed clearly in his memories. Early attempts of rebellion had been coldly and brutally checked, until he’d learned his lesson. Obedience had preserved him in his past life.

But it was stifling him now.

Mr. Graves hadn’t expressly forbidden him from visiting the No-Maj town again, and he was so often in his office that they sometimes didn’t see each other until dinner. Credence hadn’t heard back from Tina yet, and besides, it was nearly Christmas and he owed Modesty a card and something nice—ribbons for her hair, or boiled sweets. In another day or so, it would likely snow, and once that happened, he would be trapped even more firmly in this lonely, hulking old skeleton of a house. If he left for town after breakfast, he would reach the main street before noon and be back at Greythorn well before supper.

So decided, Credence shrugged on his too-thin coat the next morning, the same black wool he’d arrived in, and lined his shoes with old butcher paper from the kitchen. He tucked the letters for the Goldsteins and Modesty into his pockets and jammed his hat over his hair—too-long and curling since Chastity had last trimmed it—and set out down the old forest path town into town. It was a longer, colder walk than he remembered, and the leaves had dropped so thickly on the path that even the magical nature of the trail couldn’t keep the way fully clear of big drifts of dry leaves. He kicked at them as he walked and felt his mood and thoughts lighten. So what if he was never able to use magic properly? If he could learn to manage his temper instead, perhaps the MACUSA might let him continue living among the No-Majes, as he’d already been doing. He could live somewhere farther from the crowds—there were places, out in Long Island, where no one but seabirds nested, accessible only by boat. He could live there, and ferry into town on weekends. If she liked, Modesty could visit, when she wasn’t at her school for young witches.

Credence’s mouth twisted and he sighed. At least Modesty would be taken care of; the evaluator from Ilvermorny had assured Tina that the youngest Barebone would have no problem qualifying for admission in two years, if she chose to attend. And after that, she could very well be too busy to visit her poor adoptive brother who was too Squib for wizards and not Squib enough for No-Majes.

Town, fortunately, proved to be as reassuringly diverting as Credence had hoped. It was still very small and brief in comparison to any block in Manhattan, but with the upcoming holidays, it was busier with tourists driving past to see relations or further up into the mountains where snow was already thick enough for sleighing. He attracted very little notice as he slipped into a shop to buy a quarter-pound of taffies and maple sugar for Modesty, then to the post office to send it all off with another letter, concisely outlining his life. Almost as an afterthought, he felt his pockets, drew out the poppy flower and dropped it into the envelope before sealing.

Afterwards, Credence made his way to the small luncheonette packed with chattering passersby, in their bright colorful winter wear. Fortunately, there was a seat at the counter, wedged between the window and a business man passing through town, judging from his urbane blue coat and briefcase. Credence ordered coffee and savored its bitter, burnt taste and thought it was strange to miss terrible coffee so much.

It wasn’t just the coffee either, he realized—it was this… ordinary, nonmagical existence, where people walked or drove places instead of popping in and out of thin air or walking through fireplaces. People, in knickerbockers and propping golf clubs over their shoulder instead of brooms. Paintings that were immobile, chairs that stayed put. He stared into his coffee glumly. Was it strange to miss an existence one was equally unsuited to, just because it was all one had known?

“More, sir?”

Credence startled as a harried server swung by his corner. “Oh, no thank you,” he replied, and laid out a few extra pennies as a tip—it wasn’t like his money was going to other use.  She smiled and rushed off to greet a new group of boisterous customers the door.

Sighing, Credence slid off his chair and edged past the other tables, glancing at the clock on the wall. Outside, it had been sickly pale all morning, and rapidly turning that queer gray shade that promised a heavy storm. Others it seemed were just as concerned about the weather—the locals were bringing in the sandwich boards and carting enormous bags of salt and food back to their cars and wagons. The out-of-towners were likewise making off down the main road in their cars—some heading further into the mountains, and most heading out. Credence spotted the blue-coated man squinting out through the window of the luncheonette, likely calculating the amount of time he had to get out before the storm began. As Credence should be doing as well.

The road back up to the trailhead sprouted off a curve of the main street and wended around the old gas station. Credence tucked his chin in against the chill wind and quickened his stride, hoping that the exercise would do what his coat wasn’t capable of and keep him warm.

 It was just as well he couldn't perform magic traditionally, otherwise he'd be tempted to start a fire in that old oil drum lined up against the back of the gas station, just to keep warm for a few moments. It wouldn’t be a large fire, just a small one, but bright and snapping like it was a full, cheery bonfire. It would smell—oh, not of greasy, foul old oil, but wood and pine sap, a clean, fiery scent. Credence could practically taste the wood smoke, he wished for it so…

But no, there was a smell of smoke somewhere.

Credence stopped mid step and stared at the oil drum. It was smoking. As he watched, blinking, an eager tongue of flame licked out above the rim. A wild look around him assured that no one else was in the vicinity to oversee the fire, and he ventured closer. It was a fire exactly as he’d imagined, crackling and fragrant. He hardly dared to wonder but, could it be—was it only coincidence, or… perhaps the fire was already lit when he walked by, but no, that wouldn’t have made sense either.

“What… is there a fire?” someone asked from around the corner.

Credence’s mind flashed blank white in panic as the footsteps quickened, the voices rising in question, demanding the source of the flames. In a great, nervous rush of desperation, he thought, _No more!_ and jerked his hand over the oil drum in a wild, instinctive slash.

The fire abruptly disappeared. Even the smoke and smell of burning pine sap was gone. The cold rushed back in and stung Credence’s face as he stumbled back a step, then another. He glanced at his hand, then whirled around, trying to see if he’d been spotted. Not yet, but people were coming up around the corner. He pushed himself into motion, blindly following the road and nearly breaking into a run when someone crossed the street towards him; it was the blue-coated man from the diner, and his wide eyes were fixed on Credence, mouth slack.

“Excuse me,” the man called, but Credence was heading swiftly for the forest path, making use of his long, swift stride. Behind him, the stranger tried to catch his attention again, but it was easy now to pretend he hadn’t heard anything, and Credence crunched into the tree line, heart thudding against his ribs and determinedly ignoring the urge to turn and watch as the gas station workers stumble about the oil drums, loudly exclaiming and wondering where the smell of fire had come from.

 

Credence was in such a daze, lost as he was in his own shock that he failed to note the swift turn in weather. The next thing he knew, the snow had begun descending over the Adirondacks. He was shaking with cold and slipping on the mud and stones beneath his feet and didn’t dare think of fire in case whatever happened, happened again, but this time in a place full of ready wood. Before he’d realized, the storm had swept in with swift fierceness, the gale shaking through the trees and searing him to the bone with cold. He stumbled and was blown off course, fetching up against the trunk of an old maple.

For a moment, Credence clutched at the tree, forcing himself to remain upright. How stupid he’d been to agree to this exile. How stupid he’d been, to have left Manhattan at all. The city, with its own harshness in the steel and glass towers and pavement and hardened populace, was at least harshness Credence could navigate. There was nothing around but trees and soil and snow, and as soon as the sun went down, he would be lost forever in pitch black darkness, not even a stray gas light to direct his way. They’d find him frozen to the tree the next morning, he thought fatalistically, and then what would Modesty do? With that dire thought in mind, he pushed himself up and back into the icy wind and tried to continue his way back to the estate.

Only to find that in his blind stumbling, he had left the forest path, and now it had all but disappeared, to his non-functioning sense of direction. With a sudden, sinking sort of certainty, Credence gripped at his thin coat and knew that he was lost.

Now would be a good time for some fire. Credence shivered as he reached for a twig from the ground and brushed the snow off best as he could. Fire, he thought at the twig half-heartedly. _Fire!_

Nothing happened, of course.

Around him, the skies were darkening, and the wind was blowing snow in horizontal gusts.  If he stayed, he would be dead by the time anyone realized he was missing. Credence had spent his entire life until now getting by on his decidedly nonmagical two feet.  He swallowed and stated walking again.

If only he had magic! Real, true magic, the kind Tina waved so effortlessly about with her wand, the kind President Picquery could perform with a single sharp word. Not this twisted perversion that haunted him – that could have been normal magic in any other life, but as it were had somehow turned him into a horrifically unpredictable catastrophe in waiting.

Misery and resentment dragged at his every step and the cold and wetness had long set into his bones. Damn Mary Lou! The thought sprang into his thoughts with bold desperation. Damn the MACUSA for losing track of him as a child, then sending him to this cursed place. Damn Tina for finding him, for taking him away and showing him an entire new world he had no hope of entering. Damn the wretched haunted, lovely old wreck he was condemned to. Damn, damn, damn! He should leave, now. Turn back towards town, and prey on the sympathies of passing motorists for a ride—anywhere but here.

And from within his numb body, Credence could feel that rumbling darkness threaten. But he was frozen and exhausted. The woods around him were deep and dark, or he was snow blind. His legs trudged forward, mechanically, his teeth clenched together so hard in a paroxysm of cold and helpless misery it felt like the top of his skull would crack and roll right off, and his skin fizzed like his blood had turned to soda and vinegar. He didn’t want to go like this.

Not like this!

The blurred vision, the gray veil that filmed over his eyes as the fizzing turned sharp and prickled down his arms and spine—the snow and cold made it hard to realize at first, but then Credence gasped. Above him, in the wind, something else was shrieking. It was difficult to make out, and he could barely turn his head to look; just managed to flinch as a massive, shadowy form sprang at him from the branches. Pure shock and terror jolted through him, and his strangled gasp released a wisp of curling black fog. Another harrowing shriek and Credence stumbled, listing to the side and fetching up against a hard, burning cold post, that he only realized was the gate to Greythorn after he half-fell through. His face, his hands, his feet were numb, and though the wind was suddenly quiescent, the strange attacking creature abruptly gone, he was still frozen. His lashes were brittle with snow and tears, blurring his vision so as to make the path before him waver with shadows, threading back and forth.

Credence buckled, terror and exhaustion overwhelming his balance and giving way to that familiar boiling monster surging from where it forever simmered just under his skin—

 “-you! Hey, what in Deliverance you doing out here?” The shout was almost lost in the howl of wind and fizzing black tendrils of magic. Credence, half lost to his own traitorous abilities, barely registered the words and the dark figure that came barreling up to him through the whiteout snow storm. But then, a wave of heat slapped him broadside, sunk too-fast into his skin. He cried out in shock and agony as the magic forced him from frozen numbness to _steaming._ It was like being boiled alive, and his breathe stuttered in his lungs. His world tilted but the man caught and steadied him.

Credence stared, watery eyed with surprise, into the scowling beetle-browed face of his savior. Zagreus looked thunderous as he hauled him upright, ignoring Credence’s shout of pain as the magic chased the ice from his blood ruthlessly. “What the _hell_ are you doing out here? Who goes for a stroll in a blizzard, what kind of asinine decision was that? What—are those _Oxfords_? In the _snow?_ In the _woods?_ ” Each addition seemed to raise Zagreus’ formidable eyebrows a little higher. They snapped down and together again and his eyes pierced Credence accusingly. “Were you _trying_ to die?”

“N-No, sir,” Credence stuttered, weak with the blazing pain that now seemed to have set his body afire from the inside. His nose and eyes streamed, tendrils of steam wicking from his skin. “I lost th-the path.”

“Christ,” Zagreus muttered, which seemed mundanely profane in comparison to the other fantastical oddities the Goldsteins usually preferred. “Pack of boneheaded morons, every single one.”

Credence would have apologized and removed himself, except that the warmth had finally penetrated his bones and the fearsome burning had begun to mellow into an itchy warm ache. He found himself clutching the groundskeeper’s arm, beset by a sudden and unwelcome urge to weep.

Something of that must have showed in his face because Zagreus looked startled and then vaguely hunted, but he didn’t shake Credence off. After a beat, he sighed gustily, squinted back out at the storm, and tapped his gloved hand against his thigh. “Well let’s get you back to the house. That wasn’t a gentle spell, but it’ll set you right faster than anything else,” he said gruffly, and quickly, before Credence really understood what he was doing, bit his thumb and flicked the blood out onto the snow.

Before their eyes, a pathway cleared obligingly, the snow sliding away from a bare dirt trail. Now that the way was clear, Credence realized the stark difference where they were, versus the world outside the gate. Beyond it, the storm raged, but just inside the boundaries of the old estate, its viciousness was muted. The gate swung shut silently and faded into nothingness.

“Thank you,” Credence managed, throat thick with unspeakable relief and simultaneously an echoing, inexplicable grief. “ _Thank_ you.”

Zagreus didn’t reply beyond a faint grunt, but he walked slowly and didn’t try to hurry Credence along. They weren’t very far from the manor at all—Credence had managed to control his emotions by the time they broke through the tree line, but the sight of the house in aggressive wintry splendor nearly broke him. Zagreus seemed to sense he was at the end of his rope and hustled him efficiently through the kitchen door. Before he could comprehend, Credence was being led into the warmest seat at the breakfast table, closest to where the wood stove was cheerfully radiating heat and boiling a pot of something savory on its range, a ladle idly spinning around the rim. Zagreus fetched a clean linen napkin from a sideboard in the hall and shook it out until was a large, thin towel. He then tucked it over Credence’s shoulders briskly. With enviable ease, Zagreus floated mugs and coffee pots and cream about in casual airborne choreography that spoke of a familiar task. Separately and by hand, he poured out a small shot of murky amber liquid from a smoked glass bottle and wordlessly proffered it.

Credence took the glass and cautiously drank it down. He almost choked as a flare of heat and pressure swelled and blew from his ears with a whistle like a steam engine.

“Pepperup,” Zagreus said, and plucked the shot glass from his hands, replacing it with the coffee. “It’ll warm you up and run off a cold.”

“It’s very strong,” Credence croaked politely, waiting for his eyes to stop watering and ears to stop steaming. “Thank you.”

“Yeah, well, can’t have you dying out here and going missing,” Zagreus said, making his own cup of coffee. “You’re damned lucky I was out there.”

“Yes, I know,” Credence said.

“Do you? You go out barely dressed for this weather, and then go beyond the gates? Just because you can leave doesn’t mean you should. Dane alive, kid, there’s bears out there, not to mention mountain lions, and heaven forbid you run into a harpy nest and get your face shredded. And hidebehinds! They caught one out here two years ago, and you sure as hell don’t want to meet one!” Zagreus turned his head sharply at that and stared hard.

Credence, embarrassed and now too-warm and uncomfortably damp, occupied himself with the coffee. There was a short sigh and stomping up and down the tile floors, and then Zagreus took his coffee away from under his nose and thrust a bowl of stew into his hands instead.

“B-But dinner…”

The old groundskeeper rolled his eyes and jerked his thumb over the shoulder. “If you want to go eat that highfaluting la-di-da nonsense in that great big mausoleum of a dining hall, you’re welcome to it. Never liked it myself—nothin’ wrong with eating in the kitchen.”

“I expect Mr. Graves has a different standard, what with his upbringing,” Credence said, but half-heartedly, and flinched when Zagreus made a very loud and rude sound in response.

“Believe me, you have no idea what Mr. Graves is like,” he promised darkly, with an odd, ironic glint to his eyes.

Credence drew himself up as best he was able with shivers still trembling up and down his limbs. “He’s been very kind to me,” he protested, but was cut off when Zagreus scoffed.

“He’s kept you prisoner,” he shot back bluntly, “in this old abandoned horror of a place, with no one to talk to, and nothing to do.”

“It’s- It’s not like that,” Credence insisted, out of, if he had to admit, mostly courtesy. “I’m- I’m learning. A lot.”

“About what? Bird song?” Zagreus said, poker-faced.

With a shrug, Credence stared back down at his stew, cheeks burning. His magic was unruly—so, what? The groundskeeper certainly couldn’t help, not when Mr. Graves, MACUSA’s highly respected head Auror could barely get him to spark his damn wand.

“Eat,” Zagreus finally said, and proceeded to ladle up a bowl himself.

For the next few minutes, they ate in silence. It was good stew—hearty and simple, of the same sort that Chastity used to make, except richer and thicker with herbs and meat. Credence scraped the bottom of the bowl and blinked in surprise before Zagreus took the bowl from him and gave him a second helping.

“Are there really… harpies in the woods?” Credence asked.

Zagreus rolled his eyes. “Used to be that a mating pair nested at the top of the Owlery here. They interfered too much with the spellwork in Laramie Graves’ lab; their presence kept neutralizing certain things, and so they were relocated. I imagine there’s still a few of their descendants in the thick of it.”

“Oh, I… thought they were myths.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” Zagreus said. “You should finish that before it goes cold.”

“Why are you being so nice to me?” Credence asked before he realized.

“Was I?” Zagreus said dryly.

Credence shrugged. “Nicer than most.” He could feel Zagreus’s perplexed stare boring into him so he stared into his bowl a little more. “I’m a… prisoner,” he said, rolling the word around his mouth experimentally.

“Yes, I had gathered,” Zagreus said dryly. “Though to be fair, Seraphina’s administration is the sort to arrest first, ask later. That Mr. Graves once detained a thirteen-year old kid for taking his mom’s wand into Central Park to rescue a kitten in a tree.”

“Mr. Reeves,” Credence said carefully, “I murdered my mother.”

Zagreus leaned back and peered at him expressionlessly. “ _Did_ you.”

Credence shrugged. “Not directly. I… lost my temper. MACUSA thinks it’s something to do with repressed magical ability, but they aren’t certain, but I destroyed the- the church. Mary Lou was injured, fatally.”

Zagreus said, “Sounds like that was an accident.”

“It doesn’t matter, I guess. I’ll never be able to leave Greythorn now.”

Zagreus made an odd sound. “ _Why?_ ”

“Because… I’m a monster,” Credence said mournfully.

The hard clatter of a bowl on the tabletop and the screech of the stool made Credence hunch into himself. Perhaps, now, Zagreus’ shock would turn into newfound wariness. He would run, or shout at him to leave.  Or… Credence shivered and remembered their first meeting, Zagreus in the woods, with his brisk and violent efficiency.

Such were his gloomy thoughts, so the wheezing noise at first did not penetrate. When it did, Credence jerked upright and blinked in befuddlement at Zagreus who had his head in one hand, fist on the table, and was shaking with mirth.

“Is- is that funny?” Credence asked hesitantly.

In response, Zagreus gave another loud bark of laughter and pounded the table with his fist. “I’m sorry, kid. I wasn’t expecting a first-row seat at the Palace today.”

“I’m not a vaudeville act, Mr. Zagreus,” Credence replied, heat creeping into his cheeks and voice. “I’m- I’ve done horrible things, because I can’t- _control_ this… in me. And being here is supposed to help, but it isn’t. I’m getting worse. Whatever is in me is still twisting and growing, and I’m terrified I’m going to- to _destroy everything-_ ”

“Credence,” Zagreus cut in. “ _Breathe.”_ He didn’t look alarmed, only stern, the lines in his forehead and bracketing his mouth deepening. He sounded as if he faced down unpredictable agents of chaos daily.

That tinge of impatience, more than anything else, made Credence gulp his breath and hold his tongue.

Zagreus pulled off his cap and ran a weathered hand through wiry gray hair. “What exactly are you meant to be learning here?”

Credence swallowed. “Magic.”

“Well, there’s your problem, kid,” he said. “It’s not something you learn. You either have it or no. Luckily for you, you’ve got it in spades.”

“But it won’t- I still can’t get my wand to _work_ , and Mr. Graves says I may never be able to,” Credence said.

Zagreus’ expression darkened briefly. “Then put away your wand and try something else.”

“W-what?”

Brusquely, Zagreus snapped his fingers, and Credence’s empty bowl turned into a turtle. Credence gave a strangled shout and only barely managed not to drop the poor thing. He stared at Zagreus incredulously.

“Now, I’m better’n most without my wand, but Transfiguration was never my strong suit,” Zagreus said, taking the turtle up and examining the faint floral pattern still etched into its shell. The turtle waved its arms and legs feebly before deciding that this was a day better spent indoors and retreated into its shell.

“You don’t have a wand?” Credence asked, recalling that one instance Zagreus had borrowed his pine wand for the windows.

“I used to,” Zagreus said, and set the turtle down on the kitchen counter. “Should’ve made it a butter dish; don’t think I can risk turning it back without a wand.”

Credence shook his head and proffered his. “I wouldn’t be able to do that, wand or no.”

“Have you tried?” Zagreus asked dryly, taking the pine wand and tapping the turtle back into a bowl. He hissed lightly and dropped the wand on the table but made a little flourish at the newly green-tinted bowl. Credence was getting well fed-up with his superior arrogance, as if he somehow knew better than the best of MACUSA and Mr. Graves. Who was he to say anything at all, this glorified gardener who’d probably never knew other wizards besides the Graves family?

“Of course I have,” Credence said. “I’ve read the books, I’ve practiced the motions and the pronunciation, and keeping a cool head and drinking the potions and the breathing exercises-”

Zagreus rolled his eyes. “Mercy Lewis, you summoning a demon or learning magic? If that’s not working, you ever thought of doing the opposite?”

“What?”

“You’re overthinking it, and it’s making it worse,” Zagreus said. “Look, ignore what you’ve read, and stop drinking whatever they told you to drink. And let yourself feel— you really think you’ll be throwing battle spells with absolute _sangfroid_?”

Credence paled. “My temper has consequences, Mr. Reeves.”

The old man rolled his eyes and slapped his thigh as he stood up. “Yours and mine both, kid. Look, go take a hot bath and go straight to bed.”

“But- dinner, and Mr. Graves-”

Zagreus snorted. “I’ll let him know what happened. You need to keep warm and get some early rest tonight; magic can only do so much.”

Credence watched him leave silently, clutching the towel about his shoulders, trying—and failing—to make sense of the last hour of his life.

 

 

“I noticed you had an early night yesterday. Mr. Reeves informed me he’d rescued you from the storm yesterday,” Mr. Graves said when Credence stumbled in to breakfast the next morning. He sipped from his usual dark brew and eyed him speculatively. “I hope you aren’t feeling too poorly in the aftermath?”

“Oh, just… still a little under the weather,” Credence mumbled and concentrated on buttering his toast. He had slept like a rock last night, exhausted and aching and hadn’t woken until his bedside clock insisted that he’d miss breakfast if he wasn’t downstairs in ten minutes.

“Quite literally,” Mr. Graves quipped, and Credence smiled weakly back. The snow had howled and blown all night, not that Credence heard it much. Now, the sun had returned, but there would be no more treks outside, at least for the week—the snow piled almost three feet deep in some corners. “I hope your plans for today did not involve a walk about the property.” He smiled, close-lipped and knowing and Credence bit into his toast to hide his discomfort. Though there hadn’t been an outright order to stay away from town, Credence felt that were Mr. Graves to know of his whereabouts the day before, he would surely be angry.

“What were you doing wandering about outdoors in a storm?” Mr. Graves asked, and Credence’s brain stalled.

“Research,” he blurted out, and bit his tongue. His companion’s eyebrows rose.

“Oh?”

“I thought… I’ve been doing some research,” Credence said. “On- on my own.”

An incredulous grin tugged at Mr. Graves’ lips. “Is that so?”

Once again, Credence was struck by how starkly dissonant Mr. Graves seemed in the pale light of day. There was something guarded and dangerous about this sharp-edged man that made Credence’s nerves sing—but from nerves or fear or attraction or anticipation, it was impossible to parse.

Credence shook his head, hesitant. “I was wondering, if you might indulge me and… I’d like to try spell work. Again. Just, I’ve been thinking and I had some ideas,” he stammered, flushing hotly as Mr. Graves stared, unblinking. There was silence for a long moment, and then Mr. Graves smiled almost pityingly.

“Let’s meet in the conservatory,” he suggested.

Credence swallowed and nodded.

 

Of the two of them, it had been Modesty who had adapted quicker than Credence, despite her greater reluctance initially. She had never been a sweet child, but her forthright, impetuous character was its own brand of charming; her terror and shock held only as long as it took for her voracious curiosity to assert itself and then she became another kind of shock altogether as she hared off after answers to such questions as, ‘If the Hot Humbugs make you breathe fire, and the Tingle Tincture gives you freezing breathe, what happens when you eat both at the same time?’

Modesty’s first act of magic was nothing like the chaotic, rancorous events that plagued Credence—as she told it, one day she was alone in the apartment while Tina was at work and Queenie had accompanied Credence to another MACUSA interview. It was just before lunch and she’d been thinking about pie all morning, the drippy sour cherry kind that she’d had once at a church gathering, when Mary Lou still socialized with other churches. When the pastor’s wife had offered her a whole slice, Modesty had enthusiastically accepted, taken one, teeth-achingly sweet, gloriously tart bite, before being yanked away by Mary Lou and scolded for her sinful gluttony. The slice had tumbled into the dirt, a small sad red and yellow carcass left to the rats of Two Bridges. And then, Modesty looked up from her thoughts and saw, a slice of drippy sour cherry pie sitting on the dining table, glistening and still warm.

“I wished for pie, and there it was,” she’d said once Queenie and Credence had returned, evidence of her first magical work reduced to crumbs and red sticky streaks and the glint of defiance in her eyes.

 

 

Mr. Graves laid out on the table a lovely glass paperweight, the wizarding kind that shone and swirled with a miniature galaxy within. Then he stepped back and inclined his head.

“Shall we try levitation?” he suggested, eyes brimming with cool amusement. As Credence raised his wand hesitantly, Mr. Graves added, “There is no shame in being a Squib.”

Credence winced, and the tip of his wand trembled. He shifted his weight as Mr. Graves came to stand behind him and tried to concentrate.

“Wingardium Leviosa,” he croaked, then cleared his throat and tried again. “Wingardium leviosa!” And again, “Wingardium le-leviosa!”

As before, the creeping black thing under his skin fizzed restlessly in waves, but nothing seemed to happen.

“Control your mind,” Mr. Graves murmured, and though he meant to help, irritation lashed through Credence, before he tried to suppress it.

But then, he thought, why not… _not_?

Credence breathed in. He recalled yesterday, the chill snap in the air, freezing, wet wool pressed down his arms and side, and the overwhelming, desperate desire for heat, and sunk his teeth into the thick despairing feel of it. Frustration and resentment to sing down his veins.

“Wingardium leviosa!” he ordered through gritted teeth, seething fury coursing past his tongue.

The paperweight shot up from the table and hurled itself into the ceiling, smashing against the unbreakable glass. It broke apart, the crystalline fragments skittering in all directions against the curved ceiling before the movement stopped. A miniature galaxy, freed from its glass case, pulsed and spun lazily amidst the shattered remains.

Credence gaped, craning his head back to stare. The shards were suspended in a fine mist of glittering shards above their heads.

“I did it,” he marveled, and turned to Mr. Graves, a helpless smile tugging at his mouth. “Mr. Graves, I did it! I-” He faltered at the expression on Mr. Graves’ face. It was hard and cool, unsettlingly blank, but so swiftly replaced by a mild smile Credence almost missed it.

“Oh, yes, Credence, well done,” Mr. Graves said, in an indulgent tone. “That is very impressive an effort.”

Credence glanced up at the glass, uncertainty creeping in.

“Forced magic, like that, can be dangerously volatile – did you notice you'd cut yourself?” Mr. Graves gestured and Credence's hand flew up to his cheek where a thin wet streak skated his cheekbone.

“But it worked, right?” Credence insisted, rubbing the blood off on his sleeve.

Mr. Graves looked vaguely encouraging. “It's a start,” he said, but Credence could hear the dubiousness to the words and a cold lump of doubt solidified and sunk in his gut. The shards came raining down quite suddenly and he threw up his hands to shield himself, but Mr. Graves waved and the glass disappeared. He considered Credence, a slight frown marring his handsome face, long enough that Credence felt overwarm and antsy. Reaching out, he healed the cut on Credence’s face with a light touch; Credence’s eyelashes fluttered and the cut tingled after Mr. Graves’ fingers had gone.

“Perhaps that is enough for today, Credence,” Mr. Graves said, then, softening, “I know the disappointment is sharp right now, but time will dull the edge. In the meantime, there is plenty for you to occupy yourself with. You have been doing such excellent work in the library. You’ve been marvelous with the house.”

As he spoke, the groundskeeper stalked past the windows, striding through the knee-deep snow. In deference to his surroundings, he had on thick black boots and a heavy workman’s coat, but otherwise looked his usual bad-tempered self. He didn’t seem to notice or care that the two other occupants of the manor was watching him through the elegant windows of the conservatory.

“Always walking the grounds, that one,” Mr. Graves murmured out loud. “Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”

Credence eyed him uncertainly. “Wonder what?”

“Almost as if he’s patrolling, no?” Mr. Graves looked thoughtful, a slow, thin frown creasing his face.

“I… is that not part of his… responsibilities?” Credence ventured.

Mr. Graves’ lip curled. “He does it too well,” he said in a tone that was too neutral to be complimentary. With a sharp, angry flourish, he turned towards the door. “I have research to follow up on. Credence, I shall see you at dinner.”

“Oh, Mr. Graves,” Credence said abruptly. He flushed when Mr. Graves paused and turned to him. “I- I wanted to say… thank you, for your gift. That is, it- it’s very kind of you. I will take good care of it.”

Mr. Graves looked blank before smiling quizzically. “Of course, I trust you will,” he said, and disappeared into the house.

 

Credence remained in his seat and glanced out the window. Outside, Zagreus was already disappearing beyond the tree line, his path a deep, shadowed slash across the snow-whitened meadow. This morning when Credence woke, his clothes had been dried and wiped of mud and water stains, his shoes reshaped and newly soled with magic. More notably, hanging beside his usual dull suit was a beautiful wool overcoat of charcoal gray, double-breasted and slightly Edwardian, but long enough even on Credence to hang below his knees. It was the most luxurious thing Credence had ever touched—warm and dry, smelling faintly of cedar. He’d thought Mr. Graves, having learned of his unfortunate adventure from Zagreus, must have sent it to him. It was kind of him—almost surprisingly so. Not that Mr. Graves had ever been anything other than courteous to him, but… he wasn’t a warm personality either. Not like the Mr. Graves in his dreams.

Credence scrubbed at his face and sighed. There he went, mixing reality with his silly dreams, as if trying to- to _better_ Mr. Graves somehow, to make him more like how _Credence_ thought he should be. It was shameful of him, to have such awful thoughts about his host, as if Credence was some sort of judge as to what was kindness and what wasn’t. Actions counted, not personality; Mr. Graves seemed the type to do his good deeds without needing any recognition in turn.

Credence pushed aside his thoughts and looked gloomily at his wand. He'd almost had it – he believed it.  This time, it had felt different, indescribably so. For a twist of a second, before the spell reared wildly awry, it was- it was the same satisfaction of stepping into your shoes after finally shaking out the pebble. Like navigating a darkened hall, after having seen it brilliantly lit. That first extreme instance had cleared the brambles in his way somehow. He thought he could still almost feel the way the magic had moved through his mind.

There was a dried bouquet of roses hanging against the windows. Credence stared hard at the bundle and tipped his wand. “Wingardium leviosa,” he whispered.

The roses shivered.

 

 

“Wingardium leviosa!”

Credence in the library managed to rattle one book, stuck two to the ceilings, then three books whipped past his head and rammed themselves into violent order on the shelves. The whole shelf creaked precariously.

“Wingardium leviosa!”

A chair rose in a cloud of dust and spun lazily besides the _History of Magick in America_ and he flushed with joy. Was so full with it, he knew with sudden, striking clarity that he could not remain inside, the same instinct that gripped the sick with dire certainty that the next destination could only be the outhouse.

He ran out the library, skidded down the hall, feeling as though he were throwing sparks with each step. Around him, the carved wooden panels gleamed, the figures clapped and laughed silently as he passed. His hand brushed against the walls, fingertips trailing the panels and sinking that fizzing joy past his skin and into the wood itself. There was still too much of it inside; Credence laughed breathlessly and dashed through the kitchen until he could fling himself out through the backdoor into the knee-deep snow.

“Wingardium leviosa!” he shouted, giddy with the magic that overwhelmed his veins.

Thunderous chaos and an abrupt blackout answered his call.

Or, once Credence had caught his breath and balance back, an impossibility. He stared. Before him was meadow grass, flattened and yellowed from the cold, but all too visible because the thick blanket of snow that had accumulated now hung in a smooth, solid sheet seven feet above the ground. His veins were singing with magic—it coursed in burning lines down his arms and neck and torso, painful but also wonderful, and apparently it was exultant enough to levitate an entire field of snow.

“Mercy wept,” someone uttered. Credence startled and the spell cut—for a weightless moment, the blanket of snow hung frozen in midair, but cracks pierced the smooth white surface, and like plates with the table yanked out from underneath, the snow smashed down to the ground in an echoing booming crash, and also nearly buried Zagreus, having come up from behind and caught the worst of the snow displaced on impact.

The old man yelped and scowled and wiped his face off, and then he looked at Credence with—not fear, exactly, but wary astonishment.

“S-sorry,” Credence managed, swallowing back irrepressible giggles. He reached out, giddy, and brushed the snow from Zagreus’ shoulder, then, emboldened, gave him a pat. Zagreus’ bushy brows rose and Credence had to bite back another wave of mirth. The groundskeeper drew his hand down his front and the remaining snow rolled off of him, depositing in a neat little half circle at his feet. Credence peered at it and knew in his strange, magic drunk mind that had he wished—wished!—he could return the snow to Zagreus' shoulders, form a perfect collar about his neck , trail like a majestic cloak down his back. It would be so simple, now that he could trace the iridescent trails that lingered and swirled gently from Zagreus’ fingers.

“Hey, hey, you with me?” Zagreus reached out for Credence's shoulder then hissed and jerked back. Black strands sparked, lightning like, over Credence's arms and he swayed. The world tilted and slid past him like oil on a hot pan; one moment the sky was above him and then all he could see were the deep black green off the woods. Someone cursed—Credence was serenely unperturbed as he was jostled into strong, wiry arms and maneuvered upright. Beyond the trees, far, far away, a pair of glistening black eyes, the eyes of a beast that waited outside the gate, hidden in the branches. Now that he could see it in sunlight, in magic, he realized it was beautiful.

“Pretty bird,” Credence mumbled, tried to reach out and touch its star-studded coat but it shied away, its outlines warping and twisting. Credence made a mournful noise. There was a loud rumbling as if from very far away, and then his chin was gripped firmly and jerked around – suddenly, all he could see was a creased, weathered face – like a map, a mask. Magic blurred the edges of Zagreus’ face, and oddly, dark spots gathered along his neck and lower jaw like a necklace. Or perhaps that was only sunspots.

“Oh,” Credence said, distracted, and tried to trace the black spots with a wavering finger.

Agony flashed through him like lightning. Credence found himself knocked breathless, flat on the cold, hard ground. The pain cleared his head briefly, and the world yawed above him, suddenly less bright.

“- _uckin_ ’ hell!” Zagreus croaked from somewhere beyond Credence’s view, sounding strangely dulled and ordinary. “Credence!”

“I’m alright,” Credence managed. He lay for a moment longer and then struggled upright, his efforts hastened with Zagreus’ assistance. Even on his own two feet, Credence reached out and steadied himself against the wall of the house.

“What in Deliverance was _that_?” Zagreus nearly shouted. “I thought you said you couldn’t do magic!”

“I- I took your advice, I-” Credence’s breath hitched and he had to suck in a trembling breath. “I tried it differently.”

Zagreus gawped at him, before muttering, “Well, I’ll say you did.”

The back door swung open behind them, revealing Mr. Graves just beyond the doorway with a stern expression.

“What is going on?” Mr. Graves asked, and though his tone was light, his eyes flickered between them coolly.

“Nothing,” Zagreus snapped back before Credence could deliver news of his success. The old man gripped his wrist painfully tight, and perhaps from the shock of his touch and force, Credence snapped his mouth shut. “Was clearing snow off the roof. Got distracted. Came down hard.”

Mr. Graves hummed, glancing out across the ruined snow. “Well goodness gracious, man, try to be a bit more careful, won’t you?” he said after a moment. “I could hear the reverb all the way down in the office.”

Zagreus sneered, swept off his cap. “Yes, sir. ‘Course, sir.”

With a curled lip, Mr. Graves inclined his head, amused at his insolence. “Please, continue. Credence, come inside, you’re all damp.”

“I- yes,” Credence said. His gaze slid to Zagreus, but the groundskeeper’s face was a stone mask, unreadable. Uncertainly, he followed Mr. Graves back into the house.

“Now tell me, was Zagreus really so careless with the snow?”

Credence blinked. “Ah,” he said, thinking on Zagreus’ grip on his wrist. “It was my fault, actually,” he said. “I came up from behind and startled him.”

Mr. Graves peered intently at his face. “…Perhaps we should bell you,” he said with a close-mouthed smile. “Credence,” his slid a firm hand on the nape of Credence’s neck, absently, unaware that his touch was a surge of electric feeling under Credence's skin. “I know it is difficult, and in the country we are rather more casual with such limited company here, to make friends. But I’ve been thinking; Mr. Reeves is nobody's proper idea of good company, and as we have seen today, his work can be dangerous if he is distracted. Be patient, a while longer my boy.”

“For what?” Credence managed, strangled. His touch burned like a brand, distracting and almost abrasive.

Mr. Graves’ eyes glittered. “Why, freedom, of course!”

 

The old manor creaked and groaned uneasily against the cold and wind – by late afternoon, the mercury had puddled down below the tens and even Zagreus who seemed fearless against the cold returned indoors before the sun completely set. He spent his evening walking restlessly through the rooms, rough hands tucked into his pockets and scowling. The times he passed Credence by, first in the library where Credence was curled into an armchair before the fire, dozing off with unusual exhaustion, then as dinner finished and Credence was heading upstairs, Zagreus did nothing more but glare blackly from the under the parlor archway, on his way to collect his own dinner, to polish silver, to dance the cake walk, Credence couldn’t begin to guess. He made to walk by, but the last few days had emboldened him and his curiosity finally overcame him. He turned and descended a few stairs, leaning against the square newel post.

“Mr. Reeves,” he said, and waited until Zagreus spun about slowly, looking faintly incredulous at being addressed in the sanctity of this very depressingly grand house. “You’ve hurt yourself again.” There were bandages visible under the cuff of his sleeve.

“It’s nothing,” Zagreus said, and his gaze flickered past him as if making sure they were alone.

Credence was silent but came forward and caught Zagreus’ wrist, pushed up his sleeve so he could see the even white strips of cloth. They circled all the way to his elbow.

The groundskeeper tugged his arm from his grip and shook his sleeve down. “It’s nothing,” he repeated, somewhat more gently.

Credence tilted his head and bit back his first reaction. Instead: “Why don’t you like Mr. Graves?”

“I can’t say,” Zagreus said with a great deal of sarcasm.

Credence didn’t change expression, except to worry at his lip, and ask, “Do you trust him?”

“I can’t say,’ Zagreus said again. He looked at Credence askance. “What’s with the questions, kid?”

“I don’t know,” Credence confessed. His thumb traced his knuckle restlessly. “Mr. Graves thinks you’re patrolling the grounds for something.” There was a sharp intake of breath; Zagreus didn’t say anything, but his jaw tightened.

Credence glanced up and down the hall, but Mr. Graves had long retired to his suite of rooms. In a very low voice, so that Zagreus had to lean in, Credence asked, “Can I trust him?”

The low lamp light cast deep shadows on Zagreus as he replied slowly and evenly, “ _I can’t say_.” The bitterness that coated his words was poisonous. Credence nodded slowly, heart thumping. He straightened up, but Zagreus’ hand shot out and fastened on his wrist, exactly where he’d gripped it before. “You should have left when you had the chance,” he said. But in contrast to his harsh words, his dark gaze was meaningful intent.

“I don’t understand,” Credence whispered back, “But I think I trust you more than him.”

“Don’t trust either of us,” Zagreus told him, and released him.

 

Summertime in his dreams, and Mr. Graves was waiting on the Owlery platform, in a starched collar shirt and striped pants, but his suit jacket was somewhere else and his sleeves were rolled up.

Credence crossed the platform to face him, and the murmur of feathers and talons echoed down from the nests and perches over his head. This Mr. Graves was a little more creased and blurred at the edges than the one in daylight. He didn’t button to the collar, and his hair was always escaping in tendrils that curled over his forehead. When he smiled, it made Credence breathless.

Tonight, with Credence’s magic slowly settling back into the proper courses in his body, a stream tentatively rehydrating an old riverbed, his mind felt as clear and cold as a spring. This was not a normal dream then; none of them had been. 

Credence held up a hand and wiggled his fingers.

Mr. Graves’ face cracked and a grin tugged at his lips. “Yeah, I know,” he said, “We felt it.” He sounded warm and proud. Credence drank it in, basked in the approval.

“It's time to decide,” Mr. Graves said, bending close. “Greythorn can hold you, but it won’t harm you.”

“Should I be afraid?” Credence asked. Mr. Graves stepped away, and before him was the grounds of the estate before him. Except the woods and meadows were covered in murky gray smoke, ugly and alarming. And at the edge, the massive black shadow flickering in and out of the treeline, a dense black shape that yet seemed to be watching them, even from such distance.

“Be unafraid,” Mr. Graves corrected. Above them, roused by some indiscernible alarm, the owlery flared into loud, chaotic life—and Credence saw it was not only owls, but bats, hawks, and small, reptilian creatures that must have been dragons that now streamed past their heads and scattered in a wide swathe out over the sky.

As in dreams, Credence found himself abruptly among them, soaring on great warm updrafts of air and feeling the sun burn pleasantly down on him while the wind wicked away the heat. For a while, he forgot about everything that haunted him in the day and simply flew.

And then, the wailing started.

 

 


	4. Chapter 4

 

 Credence nearly levitated from his bed. In the pitch darkness, he gripped his sheets and stared unseeing at the murky darkness above his bed. The cry of pain choked off abruptly, and the ensuing silence was even more terrible. Credence fumbled for his wand and grasped for the proper spell from his sleep-fogged mind.

“Lux?” he breathed, but nothing happened. “…Lumina?”

From the woods, a cacophony of terrible sound—an animal shrieking of pain and terrible vicious fury. Credence leapt from his bed, shouting, “Light, light! Please, light!”

His wand pulsed to such brilliant, bright effect Credence had to throw his arms up over his face and nearly sent the wand flying. When he'd blinked back the spots and tears, he rushed to the window, but couldn’t see anything through the mullioned glass. He shouldered them open and leaned out into the bitter cold night, holding his wand aloft.

Nothing. 

The night sky was pinned back by thousands of glimmering far away stars, but there was no moon and no light reflected from the snow's white surface. The dark expanse stretched endlessly, but as his eyes scanned the horizon, the black sky took on different shades and textures. The longer he stared, the stranger the blackness became until he realized the textures had resolved into shapes, and the shapes were expanding with alarming rapidity.

Credence threw himself sideways just as a massive gray and white bird came hurtling through the open window. It braked midair with a hard swirl of air that sent Credence's shoes tumbling over the carpet and slapping into the walls. With another flurry of wings, it perched upon the bed. Credence opened his mouth, and then closed it while the bird… thing cocked its head and regarded him with haughty, beady eyes. Short feathers rose up behind its head like a slate-gray crown.

It shrieked, and Credence flinched and nearly scrambled back before realizing it was standing one legged, the other outreaching. There was a scroll tied to its leg. Moving slowly, he untied the message with trembling hands and then hastened backwards to read it. He pressed the paper flat over his lap, fingering the dried poppy briefly and drew the lit tip of the wand over the surface.

 _Credence,_  
_Have been trying to reach you for weeks, but there's been some sort of barrier or block – owls are being turned back. Somehow received your letter yesterday—thank the stars you are well! We have reason to believe you are in GREAT PERIL; BE CAREFUL. HOLD ON TO YOUR WAND.  Do not – I repeat – DO NOT go near Mr. Graves. We’re trying to get a warrant and a ward breaking team out to Greythorn and have an agent already in place—he’s trying to get this message to you, so I pray it finds you in time._  
_– Tina Goldstein_

Credence stared at the letter, then glanced at the bird.

“I don’t think I can wait for them,” he confessed. “I think someone’s being hurt.”

The bird ruffled its feathers and clawed delicately at the air. Cautiously, Credence climbed to his feet, and after a moment, held out his arm and allowed the bird to grip his forearm. It was gentle, but its talons were wickedly sharp on his skin. Comforting, in a way, as he slipped from his room and into the dim hallways of the manor.

  

By the time Credence descended to the ground floor, the murmur of voices was faintly audible. Credence strained to hear them, and they seemed to grow louder as he followed down past the library, past the music room. How odd, that an old, magical house like this was so poorly soundproof, yet he could only be grateful. The gaslights mounted on the walls lit themselves soundlessly as he approached, half hiding, half illuminating his path. The house it seemed, was not so quiescent as its dust cloths and locked doors indicated.

Light and sound converged – Credence was in the green room, the old office spaces where Zagreus had turned him out while his dreams had made welcome. The portrait frames were empty, but as he ventured towards the table lamp that flickered on, figures began drifting into view—the haughty woman with her lace, the stern couple in matching blacks. Beryl was there too, silent for once, but smiling encouragingly from her frame. Finally, a half familiar face appeared in the small gilt painted frame, this time without a book—the hair blacker and curling, face still soft with youth, and a proud tilt to his smirk. A young Percival Graves inclined his head, and with a familiar ironic tilt of his head, directed Credence to the smooth wall before him.

Or rather, the mural, the cleverly painted trompe l'oeil of golden, glowing wood and creeping vines over the marble-carved balustrade, the arcade and its wild garden beyond lit in twilight shades. Credence brushed a painted vine and startled when butterflies fluttered past as a result.

In the midnight hour, the mural was also night darkened, but a flickering glow, like fireflight stroked along the walls.  Credence glanced at the portraits, none of which have said a word, but all who seemed to be watching him with unblinking intent.

The bird on his shoulder ruffled its feathers and cawed softly but didn't otherwise move as Credence passed his wand slowly over the mural. As he did, the painted shadows grew and shifted with his wandlight. He followed along the wall, watched as the mural grew deeper and deeper, until finally he turned and found himself inside the painted arcade. There was a door now visible at the end of the walk, just beyond the confines of the mural, out of sight from the vantage of the green study. It was painted white, fitted with square glass panes like a garden door, and flanked by two decorative statues—one of a stag and the other a vase of flowers. As he approached, the marble stag head on the plinth turned to him.

“You aren't supposed to be here,” it said.

 For one, horrible moment, Credence thought he finally understood what a heart attack felt like. When he trusted himself to speak, the stag head looked a bit impatient.

“I’m here to help,” Credence managed, strangled.

“How?” the stag replied with remarkable skepticism, seeing as it was a marble head on a hollow column. “You’re no better than a yearling with its spots still fading.”

The bird on Credence's shoulder seemed to take offense to that, and shrieked, talons restlessly kneading the delicate perch below. With a huff, the stag said, “I take issue with your tone, harpy. But your point is made. I agree that this has gone on long enough.”

The door unlocked and swung open, the stag turning to watch Credence approach the descending staircase.

“Thank you,” Credence said, lightheaded with his increasingly surreal evening. He didn’t want to know if the stag had only been insulting, or if a mythical creature was truly sitting on his shoulder.

“Best hurry,” the stag said darkly. “He won’t last much longer.”

Credence swallowed. He wished he had brought his New Testament pamphlet, if only to comfort his mind, but made do with whispering a prayer under his breath as he ventured forth. The bird huddled close to him, a warm, feathery weight.

 

The stair case did not stretch down very far, no deeper than a single level. Credence crept down quietly, hand skimming the old stone walls and following the gray flagstones to a single door of plain wood with iron hinges and handle. His exhale lingered in white drifts about his head, as if they were outside in the snow and ice, but the noises were louder. Muffled voices, a man speaking harshly. Credence hesitated and then knocked.

 The room went abruptly silent.

His wand hummed in his grip, tasting the strange new power that stuttered beneath his skin. It still hurt, in that stretchy new skin way, but every moment that passed made the magic feel more natural. When the door remained closed, Credence tentatively touched the door handle with his wand tip and asked it softly to unlock.

Like it had been waiting for his touch, the door sprung open. Credence flexed his hand, still unable to keep from marveling at what he could do and stepped inside.

“Credence!” Mr. Graves said, affecting surprise and welcome. It was false though—his smile was rigid, faint lines of shock bracketing his mouth. He straightened from where he’d been bent over a copper distiller. “I didn’t expect to see you down here. And… what have you… brought down here?”

Mr. Graves’ workshop was as richly furnished as the rooms above it but running towards a strictly laboratory appearance. The walls were built-in shelves and cabinets stocked with smoked glass bottles and leather bound boxes. Regular lamps lit the space, affixed in place by brass tubing and dark green stone. A long, obsidian table dominated the center, its surface mirror bright, and at least three cauldrons of differing make hung suspended over fire pits. Two were cold, but the copper held a slow roiling liquid, dark and with a metallic sheen. Beside it, Zagreus was hunched in a chair, stirring the potion in even, mechanical strokes. The entire space flowed so fiercely with magic that it thickened the air like humidity.

“I heard something,” Credence said slowly. On his shoulder, the bird flexed its wings, feathers brushing static against his cheek. 

Mr. Graves’ smile was tight. He extinguished the fire under the distiller and Credence watched a dark liquid—the same brew Mr. Graves drank constantly—drip slowly into a cup. “It must have been the wind, or something out in the woods. There are wild animals whose cries sound like children. It might even be that harpy you have. I had no idea they were in these woods.”

Credence looked at him sharply, then past him to Zagreus, old and bent. His shoulders were heaving in the way someone in great pain tried not to show the extent of their wounds. “Mr. Zagreus, are you alright?”

“He’s fine, Credence,” Mr. Graves said, coming forward but stopping short of taking Credence’s shoulder. “We’re in the middle of delicate work, I’m afraid—why don’t you wait upstairs, and I shall join you?”

The harpy, golden eyed and fierce, cried aloud, its piercing shriek accusatory, and something—rippled. Mr. Graves hastened backwards, smile gone from his face. His black wand described a sharp half-moon about him, but the damage was done.

There was something wrong with Mr. Graves.

Behind them, Zagreus’ knees gave and he slumped against the table, cap toppling from his white head. The hand stirring the cauldron dropped to his side. Bright red bloomed through his sleeve; blood that had been running into the potion now spread freely, staining and soaking into his thin shirt with alarming speed.

Credence’s palm was slippery with sweat, his black magic twisting agitatedly in that old sickening way. “…I don’t think I shall.”

A strange expression crossed Mr. Graves’ face—or rather, it was as if the thin veneer of his mask peeled away, leaving behind a sharper, crueler person. He smiled thinly. “Credence, please. Let’s talk.”

“Don’t,” Credence ordered, but it sounded more pleading than anything. “Mr. Reeves, can you hear me?” He raised his voice, but never took his eyes from Mr. Graves who stared unblinkingly back.

Mr. Graves clicked his tongue softly. “My, my, what friendship has developed between you two! And yet, you don’t know him at all. Doesn’t that worry you?”

“Go away,” Zagreus rasped. “Credence, go.” His words were tight, squeezed from a vise.

“He is a proud man, our good Zagreus,” Mr. Graves said. “But it’s rather too late for that, isn’t it, Credence?”

“What do you want?” Credence asked. “Why are you hurting him?”

“Gairbith Nott,” Mr. Graves said. “Do you know the name?”

Credence shook his head silently.

 “A wizard from the 14th century, and by all records, a cantankerous one. Such an unpleasant man, first the wizards, then the Muggles ran him from town. But he was a genius. Created the modern spells for home-making. The blood, the poppy, the iron, combined in such ways to bind his land to him, so that no one should make him move against his will. Of course he was not subtle about it, and when the constable arrived to arrest him, the whole plot, cottage, wizard, and officer, vanished. Not just unfindable, you understand. The barriers—unpassable. Wasn’t seen again until half a century later when the old coot died, and a miserable old acre of land unfolded right through the new town center.” Mr. Graves tipped his head in a gesture of ‘what can you do?’

“Why are you telling me this?” Credence asked, eyes darting to Zagreus.

“Gairbith Nott was a proud and vindictive fellow, and so were his descendants. He taught his disappearing trick to his children, and so forth,” Mr. Graves continued, strolling forward. “I had no idea his methods were in use anymore, not to speak of how incredibly potent their effects, when roused. Not until last month, when a descendant of his managed to raise the wards. I must say, I have learned much in my imprisonment here. It is fascinating work, and such a pure piece of magic, it’s admirable. I’m as fascinated as I am frustrated. But I think I may have finally outfoxed good Gairbith. You see, Gairbith’s method is devilish good work for keeping properties within the family, but Greythorn is between owners, did you know? It won’t take me,” Mr. Graves said with a frustrated snarl, “and we certainly can’t give it back to _him_. But you, my dear. The solution is you.”

“I think you should go,” Credence said, and raised his wand with a sort of nervous fatalism. What could he do? Levitate the most powerful wizard in New York to death? But he had to try.

Mr. Graves laughed and flicked his wrist. Credence’s pine wand sprang from his grip and sailed through the space into Mr. Graves’ palm. “Don’t you understand, my boy? I’m _trying._ But now you can help me, because you _have_. _”_

Credence froze, but his new companion did not. The harpy launched into the air, shrieking and clawing at the wizard’s face.  Mr. Graves sneered, throwing some sort of spell that made blue lightning arc through the air and Credence's tongue bloom with the faint taste of ozone. Banking hard, the harpy swept past the spell and shot over the laboratory table, dragging its claws against the glass flasks and beakers, sending them spilling across the table and crashing to the floor. With a shout of outrage, Mr. Graves whirled on the harpy and Credence took the opportunity to dart to Zagreus.

“M-Mr. Reeves,” he said, hauling the old man upright. “Are you alright?”

Zagreus’ head lolled—his eyes were open, but unfocused, and sweat sheened his forehead. Pain wreathed his face. Credence stared, because that strange black mass at Zagreus’ throat was visible once more., choking at him. Behind them was a stupendous crashing; the harpy had been thrown off course, its momentum carrying it into a shelf of noxious powders. With another terrible shriek, it disappeared abruptly in a flashbang of magic and wind, banished by a harsh stab of Mr. Graves’ wand. Credence’s eyes and nose stung and he scrambled to drag Zagreus to his feet.

“You don’t know what you’re doing,” Mr. Graves said as he rounded on them. His hair was coming loose in hanks, and there was a wild look about his eyes that made Credence shrink back, clutching Zagreus tightly against his side. “It’s because you do not understand, and it is my own fault for not explaining to you,” he said, and his calm tone was at odds with his too sharp grin. Whatever the harpy had done to him, it was beginning to show—his eyes were lighter and farther apart. His skin was sallow. There was something terribly unsettling happening to his hair, the rich coal-black slowly leaching away to the shade and consistency of straw.

“Don’t come closer,” Credence whispered, but it was a vain threat. In his arms, Zagreus convulsed. His face twisted in pain and a groan slipped through his dry, cracked lips.

“I just want to talk, Credence, that is all. I want the best for you, my boy. You see, in you, there is potential. And I admit, I didn’t comprehend at first why you had been sent away—it was my error, thinking your sister was the holder of such gifts, but I was wrong, Credence. There are many great wizards and witches in this world, but you could be one of a kind.” Mr. Graves, or whatever it was wearing his face, spread his hands. “These fool Americans, they should have embraced you. Celebrated your talent. Instead they are cowards,” he spat with contempt. “They let fear rule their lives, hiding behind rules, behind government, behind threats and fear mongering. It's a disgrace. They send you out here like you are a troubled beast they can't control when you are so much more. I understand you, Credence. I am your friend, not MACUSA. Not these cowards, full of fear.”

“What,” Credence said, full of slow dawning dread, “do you mean?”

The man who faced him scoffed. “You think the MACUSA were about to send you off like a horse put to pasture? That they would allow such a danger to their previous, pathetic existence on the margins, go on? Why do you think they sent you to their director of security? The great war hero Percival Graves?”

“No,” Credence said.

“Think, boy!” Unsettling pale eyes, the color of a sun bleached sky glittered at him triumphantly. “For how long do you think he would have played nursemaid? For the rest of his life?”

Vertigo washed over Credence. His mind reeled, somehow both shocked and bitterly resigned all at once. This made sense. It made more terrible, awful sense than everything that had happened since Tina Goldstein sat him and Modesty down in the Woolworth offices and brought them butterbeer.

“Who are you?” Credence whispered, watching the final vestiges of Mr. Graves melt away into a pale, menacing stranger with mismatched eyes and a hard smile.

“My name is Gellert Grindelwald,” the stranger said with a courtly flourish. “I would be your greatest friend, Credence.”

“That’s not true, kid.” The hoarse whisper brought him back to the present. Zagreus, still disoriented, was making a valiant effort to sit up.

“I am the only one who has been truthful,” Grindelwald snapped, a sharp snap of his fingers. Zagreus was flung away, pinned to the wall with a pained gasp. “Credence, I can help you. I’m the only one who wants what’s best for you.”

“You’re a fanatic and mass murderer, you lunatic!” Zagreus shouted back, or tried to, before the magic that collared him surged over his jaw and swarmed over his mouth. His eyes rolled, panicked and furious, before his body convulsed and arched, stiff as a board as if electrified. A horrible noise burbled up past the mask and Credence panicked. That sweeping, familiar nausea, the oppressive burning cold that rose from his gut flooded his skin.

“Please stop hurting him,” Credence pleaded, and felt a wisp of black fog curl through his teeth. But Grindelwald was unmoved. 

“He brought this on himself, Credence. He was to be your executioner, not your savior.”

Credence reached out and gripped Zagreus—no, the true Mr. Graves. “He was kind,” Credence said.

“The way farmers are to pigs before their slaughter. Don’t be a fool. I will make you a king,” Grindelwald cajoled. “Your power is not to be feared, but controlled and honed, a weapon.” Then, in a slightly more alarmed tone, “You must control it, Credence!”

But Credence stared down at Zagreus helplessly, transfixed. Zagreus' nostrils flared in pain and exhaustion, but his eyes, and were they darker now? His eyes were steady.

“I don’t think I want to,” Credence whispered, already feeling the raging storm inside him plucking at his bones, his hair.

“Credence!” Grindelwald shouted, but Zagreus—the true Mr. Graves—gave the tiniest of nods.

With a long soundless sigh, Credence gave in and unraveled into raw chaos.

 

 

An Obscurus had no business in Manhattan, President Picquery stated sharply to Auror Goldstein at Credence's hearing. But, she had continued, here was one case where recovery was a possibility. The Department for Advanced Thaumaturgical Research, in confederation with the Federal Bureau of Covert Vigilance, has proposed a probationary period, where Mr. Barebone is to be rehabilitated to the best of our agent’s ability in an undisclosed location. At the end of this grace period, he shall have an opportunity once more to prove his fit for Wizarding society in the MACUSA. If he does not pass, it will be complete exile.

“It isn’t death,” Modesty said bluntly into the ensuing silence, which had made even the stone-faced president twitch.

“I’ll come for you, Credence,” Modesty whispered after they had left and were back at the Goldstein’s. “We can escape and hide away, San Francisco is real far!”

Credence, in some ways bitterly relieved, and terrified, hadn’t replied. His sister leaned into him uncertainly, then with a burst of movement threw her skinny arms around him and squeezed him hard.

“I don’t want you to come after me,” he told her after they had held each other too tight and too long. “Not until I’m well. I don’t want to hurt… anyone again.”

“Even if they deserve it?” she’d asked, and Credence couldn’t help but smile.

“I have to come back don’t I? And I can’t come back for you if that happens again.”

Her pale face twisted into a thoughtful scowl as she weighed the justice and injustice of this statement. “Alright. But they better not do anything to make you mad either. If they do something stupid, and you tear them up, I don’t think it would be your fault at all.”

“Well, Ms. Tina seems to think Mr. Graves is a good man with a good head. I think at the end of my stay, I’ll be back and ready for you to show me around this new city,” Credence said.

“You better not be late,” she shot back and they’d leaned into each other as if neither of them really believed their own words.

 

 

Consciousness was debatable when Credence stopped existing as strictly human. There was rarely any cognizance—flashes, perhaps, but nothing consistent, and overwhelmed usually by expansive, stinging fury.

Purpose, though. That’s all the Obscurus was—purpose, made terrible and exact.

 But for the first time, Credence felt a measure of awareness. He sensed the room around him, old, gray stone sheening of magics, barely holding against the battering that his tumultuous form raged against. Yet Credence himself felt strangely at peace, and very far away.

This was no dream, but it almost felt like one. And at the center of his awareness was the presence of Mr. Graves in his dreams.

“Hello, Credence,” Mr. Graves said warmly. There was no one there, and yet, Credence was certain this was no mere hallucination. He was also doubly certain this Mr. Graves was also not the real Mr. Graves. There were benefits to becoming a magical being, and that was being able to recognize like.

“I’m sorry,” Credence whispered, because he still wasn’t quite sure what this dream figure was, but he was beginning to piece together a theory. “I—can’t control it.”

Mr. Graves laughed, and the sound resonated deeply; from the walls, the foundation below. He gave the mental equivalent of a shrug. “No matter, Credence. This place has needed a vigorous shaking up for decades. Everything will be alright,” he assured, while Credence’s shadow twined silkily at the edges.

“I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want to hurt anyone,” Credence said, thought he was already slipping into that blankness of mind, the magic plucking his thoughts and whisking them away, dashed to pieces against the wavering holding spells of the laboratory.

“My dear boy,” Mr. Graves said affectionately, and the whole house seemed to flex around them. His final words were almost lost in the roaring of wind and rumbling crumple of stone as Credence’s awareness shredded away. “Haven’t I said? We protect our own. All you need to do is say yes.”

 

 

 

Rampaging freely through the basement space was what the Obscurus did. It had no mind nor care for anyone, but its immensely magical properties flooded the space, tore past the remaining sound charms, the extension spells, scrubbed the binding spell from Percival Graves and scoured the remaining vestiges of Grindelwald’s mischief from the house. It rammed into Grindelwald, who barely had the presence of mind to fling up a shielding spell. The Obscurus snarled and battered relentlessly at the shield—was still strong enough to drag him along as it slammed through the ceiling into the ground floor, exploding up through the mahogany of the old green office, and hurling itself and its burden down the hall at breathtaking speed, shooting down corridors and then streaking, rocket-like, up, up.

Finally, the Obscurus burst into open air, the clean, sharp cold a match for its own freezing mass. Blackness spun out—a nebula, expanding in space—and for a single, timeless moment, it merely _was_. Everything laid out below was simple, from the wintering poppy garden to the iron gates out past the trees laid like sentries; there were no more questions, only understanding. Greythorn took care of its own; Greythorn was in ruins. There were invaders coming up through the woods; the invaders were to be let in. A flick of its attention and the gates opened.

Credence could be… this. Powerful, raging, uncontrollable, but fearless. Or he could be ordinary. Learn to do magic the hard way. Face his anger. But it was _so hard._

The sky above spun with stars; Grindelwald, suspended in the Obscurus’ wavering, inky depths, jerked to gasping wakefulness, blood bubbling from his lips. It was a beautiful night, and the Obscurus was now stretched almost to the gravel road. Its prisoner’s struggles and noises did not penetrate; neither did the shouts and cries that came up from the figures racing out of the woods. It barely registered the gasping of Percival Graves as he dragged himself out of the stairwell and staggered onto the owlery platform.

“Credence!” he shouted and raised a wand—scratched from where it’d been hidden and hastily retrieved. The Obscurus reared back, piling into a daunting black column. Grindelwald slammed against the roof of the owlery and dust and splintering wood rained down. “No, stop! Stop! I’m not going to hurt you!” Percival Graves dropped the wand and put both hands up. “Credence, you’re safe now! You can stop!”

The Obscurus made no indication of having understood or acknowledged his words.

“Kid, you gotta let him down sometime,” Percival said, low, like he was talking to a woodland animal.

For a moment, his words went ignored. But then, a ripple shivered through the black mass, and the air was suddenly easier to breathe. Percival sucked in a deep breath and straightened as the Obscurus shook again and with a great swooping sound sucked back into a thin black figure standing at the center of the platform. Grindelwald fell hard with a thump from where he’d been pinned to the owlery roof. Percival snatched up his wand and ropes shot from the tip to bind the wizard hand and feet. Then, he turned to Credence who was swaying on his feet and blinking dazedly.

“Did you know,” Percival said, and look at that, he’d moved right in front of Credence as if by magic. Perhaps it was. “You might be the one person on this earth that is more terrifying than Seraphina. Before she’s had her coffee.”

“Hello, Mr. Graves,” Credence murmured, squinting at the wavering face above him.

“Kid, I think you can call me Percival,” he replied wryly, and Credence smiled. He felt gloriously hollow and empty. When Percival sighed and told him to go to sleep, Credence was already halfway there.

 

 

Someone was plucking at his hair. Clever little fingers pet his forehead curiously, picked through his hair. Credence grimaced and blinked the rest of the way to wakefulness. He wondered if he was still dreaming—a strange, furry black creature with a flat, duck-like bill stared back at him with beady black eyes.

Gently, it touched his nose with a small, clawed paw.

“Oh, now you’ve gone and disturbed him, that’s naughty,” a mild voice tutted, and then the creature was pulled away with a squawk and a stranger resolved into view. He was topped with red curls and a spate of freckles across his nose and cheeks, eyes bright and blue as his gaze danced between Credence and the struggling animal in his arms. His dress, with the slightly odd coloring and cut, was of wizarding style.

“Who are you?” Credence tried to ask, but the words came in a croak instead; his throat was dry as paper. He shook and rattled with coughing and managed to push himself upright in his bed. At least he recognized his surroundings—his own room at Greythorn, late morning, by the look of the light.

“It is very good to meet you, Credence,” the stranger said, pouring him a glass of water and handing it over. “I had intended to introduce myself in town, but just missed catching you outside the borders of the estate.”

Credence drank half the glass before he felt ready to look up. “Town?” he said frowningly, and then his gaze alighted on the blue wool coat hanging over the back of the chair. His brows drew together. “Why were you looking for me?”

The man clamped the animal firmly under one arm in order to hastily throw up a placating hand. “I’m a friend of… well, my brother's a friend of Director Graves. I know Tina Goldstein,” he said quickly, absently swinging the gold chain of a pocketwatch before the animal who had stilled, watching the path of the chain with a hungry fixation. “I was the one who asked the harpy to find you. She’s alright, by the way; a little shaken up, but no lasting damage, thank Merlin.” He smiled, pleased.

“Oh,” Credence said.

After a moment, the man gave a full body twitch and stuck out his hand. “Oh! I’m Newt, by the way. Newt Scamander.” The chain swerved from the animal’s reach, and it gave a sad cry. “This is a niffler. You don’t see these in Muggle zoos very much do you?”

“Wouldn’t know,” Credence replied faintly, as the niffler yanked the chain from Newt's grasp and proceeded to stuff it down a pouch in its belly. Newt tutted indulgently and then hauled a battered suitcase up onto the bed, snapped the lid open and gently urged the protesting niffler into its depths. He shut the lid, pressing it firmly as the animal, objecting to being treated akin to a pair of trousers, vigorously shook the insides. He met Credence's look of horror with a polite smile.

“How do you feel?” Newt asked after moment, then added, “The case is… bigger than it looks.”

Credence nodded slowly. He opened his mouth then paused. He felt remarkably well, considering the circumstances. “Good,” he said, and Newt nodded back.

“Excellent, excellent. This is all very new and fascinating data for us—no pain, anywhere? Headaches?” he leaned closer with his wand. Credence reared back against his pillows and threw his hands up to stall him. Newt stopped, mid-movement, and blinked at him. He was poised at an unsustainable angle but hung there he did. “Oh, my. Wandless magic,” he murmured, and sounded more delighted than he had any right to.

“I- I’m sorry,” Credence stammered, and kicked out of his covers, heart thudding in his chest. “I have to—Mr. Gr- that is, uh, Percival, I need to-”

“Oh, wait, wait, Credence!” Newt called as Credence hunted unsuccessfully for his shoes. Someone had changed him into soft flannel pajamas, finer than anything he’d ever owned, and hidden the rest of his things somewhere. “Finite incantatum-” He jammed his feet into new slippers neatly lined besides the sea chest and hurried to the door. He flung it open and nearly crashed into a solid form.

“Slow your roll, doll,” said the soft pink wall. “Should you be up already?” Queenie Goldstein laughed and stumbled back apace as she gripped his arms to keep them both from going down. “I told you to let me know when he was up,” she chided, casually steering Credence back to the bed.

“He's quite powerful,” Newt said, shaking his limbs out. He looked pleased.

“Yes, isn’t that marvelous?” Queenie agreed, smiling at Credence. Credence, without quite knowing how it happened, had gotten his slippers off and under the covers again.

“I feel fine,” he protested feebly as she tutted, flitting around him like a colorful bird.

“Honey, you look like you went five rounds with Jack Johnson,” Queenie said not unkindly.

“Oh, I’ve a distillate for the nundus that, with some dilution, might help,” Newt suggested, but Queenie just shooed him off.

“He’s not a _beast_ ,” she said.

Newt’s head tilted, and he said apologetically, “He rather is, of a sort.”

Credence would have sunk into mortification under the combined forces of their considering gazes had the door not flung open a second time.

“Ms. Tina!” Credence uttered, an inexpressible amount of relief surging through him. And then—

“Credence!” and within seconds, Modesty had leapt across the room onto his bed, and thrown herself at him.

"What are you doing here?" Credence gasped, half laughing as her weight bowled him back into the pillows.

"We're here to stage a break out!" Modesty announced cheerfully, her skinny arms tight around his neck.

"We thought, with all that's happened, there really wasn't much more harm that could come of a supervised visit," Tina said, with pointed emphasis on the last two words, but she was beaming at both of them.

Credence buried his face in Modesty's neat blonde braids and found himself struggling against tears. His sister patted his back soothingly, holding on just as tight. From above their heads, the others murmured amongst themselves and then Newt and Queenie left the room, Tina closing the door behind them softly. She came and sat on the edge of the bed, waiting until Credence was able to loosen his grip and meet her gaze. His eyes felt hot but were dry.

"What did... happen?" he asked when he could speak evenly again. Modesty sniffled and moved to sit beside him, her arm pressed along his.

Tina's smile faltered, and she sighed. "The MACUSA owes you an apology, Credence. And now, they are in your debt as well."

"My... what?" Credence echoed. Tina nodded in affirmation.

Gellert Grindelwald, the infamous dark wizard of Nurmengard, had come to New York chasing after a prophecy. Rumors abounded, but no one knew for sure what it said—some analysts had suggested he was after a weapon, others that he was looking to shore up support for his next move. Whatever drove him across the ocean, also led him to Percival Graves, who, as luck had it, was on a brief sabbatical from work to prepare the sale of a family property and recover from a lingering illness. This was where Grindelwald's arrogance failed him—his disdain for Americans, for the upstart MACUSA, led him to mount a confrontation with the director in his own home. And while Greythorn was no Black Forest stronghold mounted by blood and bone of generations of a single clan, it was nevertheless traditional in all the proper wizarding ways, its fortifications boosted, in fact, by the accumulated paranoia of several generations of lawkeepers, from an enterprising first-generation Auror to at least three branches of an Original Twelve family. Grindelwald, posing as a prospective buyer was able to entrap a weakened Percival Graves, stealing his face and laying an archaic binding spell on his victim, but not before Graves roused the estate’s defenses.

“So they held in a sort of stalemate,” Tina finished. “Graves was bound from acting against Grindelwald, and Grindelwald couldn’t leave without the grounds rising against him. He’d apparently been getting by, making the house work for him by distilling Graves’ blood into a potion, but it was only just enough to keep up the basics. And then we sent you right into the thick of it. And that’s why we couldn’t get any owls in or out.”

Credence considered this. “But if the grounds were locked up, how did I get in?”

“You were the closest third party with magic,” Tina said frankly. “By the time you arrived, the director had mostly detached himself from the property; Greythorn was already in the process of finding a new owner. And Graves was secretly bleeding himself dry trying to keep that remaining bit of ownership that would keep the wards up. Graves thinks the house and grounds judged you non-threatening, or a potential solution.”

“Non-threatening?” Credence repeated, cracking a small, disbelieving grin.

Tina reached out and placed her hand over his. “You are more than the Obscurus, Credence.”

He ducked his head.

“More importantly,” Modesty cut in impatiently, bouncing on the mattress, “Newt says you can come home!”

“That’s not exactly what he said, and there’s still evaluation to be done,” Tina hastily said.

“How would he know?” Credence asked, trying not to feel the fluttering hope in his chest.

“He’s got a whole suitcase of animals,” Modesty confided in a pointed manner that indicated they were the only sane people in their new world.

“He’s worked with them before,” Tina said, before Modesty could explain to Credence where exactly he would have been kept in this Newt’s suitcase menagerie had things gone poorly.

“There are others? Like me?” Credence blurted out. His grip twisted the fine sheets. “Can- can I meet them?”

Tina fell silent for a moment. “Credence, you are the only known surviving Obscurial. Most of them die or are consumed by the Obscurus before the age of fifteen.”

“But, I’m almost twenty-four,” Credence said, bewildered. “…Will I die soon as well?”

“Maybe I’ll call Newt back into the room to answer those questions,” she said. “But he doesn’t think so.”

Credence fell back against the pillows and Modesty watched him with an anxious expression.

“What now then?” he asked, staring at the ceiling.

“Newt believes you can learn to control it,” Tina said. “The Obscurus. And that if you stay in a magical setting, you’ll be able to maintain…. Stability.”

“Stability,” he repeated, and she nodded.

“You can come back,” Modesty said, peering anxiously at him.

“Alright,” Credence said, and patted her arm.

 

Credence slept and dreamed, but not of Mr. Graves, and not of houses. He woke the following day to a much reduced MACUSA presence—only Newt and another MACUSA Auror were left, and Tina, Queenie, and Modesty only stayed long enough to bid him farewell before returning to the city, Modesty looking vaguely mutinous about having to go to school. Percival Graves was long gone; back to the city for medical treatment and champing at the bit to build the case against Grindelwald, it seemed.

“I’ve never known the Director to be so excited for paperwork,” remarked Tina. Credence shrugged and tried not to look too disappointed or relieved. When everyone had left, he found himself alone in the great big empty house once more. It did not seem that different at first—Credence walked from one end of the house to the other, the remaining auror trailing him silently as he peeked into the closed up rooms. The room that Grindelwald had taken was sealed off completely, awaiting further processing, but the most pressing of evidence had already been tagged and removed.

Credence stood at the open doorway and stared silently at the bedroom, a master suite tastefully decorated in the latest styles, rich dark fabrics and elegant furniture of ebonized wood and mother-of-pearl inlay. The bed covers were mussed and unmade, and a shirt was draped over the back of a black upholstered side chair. Credence strove to note the oddities, signs an imposter surely would have left. Something wildly obvious—skulls, perhaps, or the scent of brimstone. But there was nothing of the like, and Auror Cassidy Polk, a generally patient sort, coughed discreetly after Credence’s perusal of the room began verging on suspicious.

The green office was completely sealed off as well, for simple reason that the entire wall had been blown into rubble and only a firm shielding spell kept the chill wind and snow from creeping inside. What remained of the murals were blacked with dust and soot. The portrait frames were empty. Everything felt hollow and uninhabited. Credence, with something that wasn’t quite mourning catching at his breast, turned away.

Only when Auror Polk again, hemmed politely did Credence feel the tightness down his neck. He loosened his jaw and attempted a smiled, but only received a mildly alarmed look in response.

At dinner that evening, Credence met Newt and Polk in the dining room, where the table was surprisingly simple—over the gleaming surface was a table runner of green damask with patterns picked in gold thread, and the place settings included far fewer forks than the last time he’d eaten here. There were two serving platters, one of a savory-smelling brisket, the other turnips in cream. The soup tureen steamed gently between the two—oyster stew, by the look and smell, and thick slices of brown bread kept warm under a linen napkin. This was almost a familiar meal, if still far richer fare he’d eaten under the church roof.

“Something wrong?” Newt asked while Credence froze in the entry way, staring at the simple spread. The magizoologist had come in from outdoors, his cheeks ruddy and hair windblown, and Credence refused to admit how his heart had thumped when he’d heard the back door open.

“No—only, dinner was not like this, before,” Credence said, seating himself gingerly. “There were a lot more dishes, and…” Mary Lou reared up in his memories with a sneer. “Extravagance.”

Newt hummed as he helped himself to the stew. “The house must like you,” he commented.

Credence blinked, questions flitting through his mind, but neither Newt or Auror Polk seemed to feel it was a statement that needed further discussion and had moved on to the topic of the Greythorn grounds where the magizoologist had stumbled upon an ordinary fox den earlier in the afternoon.

The food was delicious, whatever the house felt about him, and afterwards, they retreated to the library with coffee and tea. Newt’s natural reticence was forgotten in his curiosity, and he shared his ideas about Obscurials and spun off on theoretical tangents that left Credence’s head spinning and Auror Polk with a mildly pained expression—the auror presence, it seemed, was as much for Credence as it was for Newt, whom, Credence gathered, was a bit of an inadvertent smuggler, if one with good intentions and stellar connections.

“Mr. Scamander,” Polk had to interject at one point, “While your idea about the containment potential of salt baths in Appalachia have much merit, please recall that Mr. Barebone has not been cleared yet to leave the estate and will not be until an independent board of evaluators and doctors sign off.”

“That shouldn’t be long,” Newt replied, almost hopefully.

Credence thought about Tina’s gentle discussion with him before her departure, about mandated sessions with magipsychiatrists and pensieves, and private tutoring, about learning to ‘manage’ the Obscurus rather than rid it, and only shrugged. That stymied further conversation, and after a long silence, Auror Polk delicately suggested retiring for the evening.

 

 

The green office was in need of repair, much as it did in reality, and Credence’s heart ached at first. But after a horrible moment passed, he began looking closer. The portrait frames were occupied once more, and the furniture was out of place, but arranged so along one side deliberately. While the mural was still interrupted by a massive hole in its center, its edges were not as ragged, the broken planes of wood having been cleared away. Golden sunshine filled the space, even more of it now that the opening served as an impromptu window. And Credence—Credence didn’t jump when a massive harpy swooped through the opening to land on the back of a green sofa, pushing her big, blunt head into his hand insistently. In this light, the shadows were gone from her feathers; she regarded him approvingly as he stroked her breast gently.

“I am glad you are well,” Credence told her. “I’m sorry for what happened.” He looked around. “This place looks different.”

“So it is when there is change,” someone said from behind. Credence spun around to see—Percival, young and portrait-perfect, smiling kindly and limned in golden afternoon light. “Hello, Credence.”

“Hello, Greythorn,” Credence replied, and was rewarded by a wave of warmth that rippled through the air. Across from him, Percival Graves blurred and morphed into Beryl Montague Greythorn, resplendent in her naval uniform.

“You are learning,” she—it? said, pleased.

“I think so,” Credence agreed. “I, uh. Should thank you, for looking after me. “

Greythorn inclined their head.  “On the contrary. We owe you a great debt.”

“Me?” Credence said, taken aback. “I didn’t do anything.”

 Greythorn smiled. “Nevertheless.”

“I destroyed half of your western wing,” Credence pointed out.

“But you will restore it.”

“I…” Credence trailed off in surprise, as Greythorn radiated warm confidence that suffused his own being. He suspected that there was some missing puzzle piece to this conversation, that he should really be awake during this discussion. “I will? How?”

Greythorn merely laughed, and the room shivered with amusement. “Accept the offer, Credence, and we shall help each other. “

“I don't understand,” Credence insisted, but that was a lie – a strange idea was flickering at the edges of his thoughts, but it seemed too grandiose to bear thinking. “Are you sure?"

The room grew brighter as the dream thinned. Greythorn didn't reply, only smiled and held his gaze as Credence drifted up into wakefulness.

At first he wasn't certain what woke him—no screaming this time, or strange noises. But then Credence realized the curtains had been left open and now bright, steady moonlight illuminated his room. He sat for a moment, wondering if he dared to close the curtains by magic, but then decided that on the off-chance he punched the windows out instead, he had best close them by hand. He shuffled into the slippers and crossed to the windows. The wavy glass did nothing to obscure the gleaming spread of snow below, nor the dark line of the woods in the distance.

And very distantly, a smudged wavering shape moving across that white, bright distance. Credence's heart leapt in his throat and his grip on the curtain twisted sharply, drawing a soft shriek of protest from the rings. An intruder? On these grounds, at night? Credence shoved the panes open, gasping soundlessly at the slap of frigid air and leaned out for a better view.

The full moon, uninterrupted by cloud or wind, rendered the grounds of Greythorn in perfect clarity. Credence blinked at the dark coated figure trudging steadily down the single shadow-blue path in the snow. His face was obscured by a dark flat cap and he was headed towards the kitchen door.

Credence pushed off the ledge and tugged his coat from where it hung off the rack and scrambled out of his room. He hurried down the hall, his slippers soundless on the carpet, barely noticing as the lamplights along his path flickered brighter. One hand on the balustrade as he flew down the stairs, and he was going so fast it seemed the steps were rising to meet his feet. Down across the grand walnut floors of the entrance hall, past the wood-paneled walkway, through the splendid dining room and into the kitchen. His slippers skidded some on the tile floor, but the counter leaned closer so he could brace and push himself forward. Credence threw his hand up to open the door, and it sprang wide without his touch. Magic, once again, in its giddiest, most urgent form. Credence, for once, didn't care, and flung himself through doorway and into the night, panting.

At the end of the footpath where it met the paved flagstones circling the house, the black-capped figure was stomping the snow and ice off his boots and glanced up. His startled expression shifted to a wry sort of sheepishness.

"Didn't mean to wake anyone up," he said. "I just-"

"Zagreus," Credence breathed and darted forward. At the very last minute, shyness overtook him and he stopped short before him.

"Hello, Credence," Percival Graves said, gruff but fond. There had been an awful fear lurking within Credence's mind—that he would meet the real Percival Graves and be unable to separate him from the imposter, the ghost of that cruel smile forever haunting him. But that wasn't at all the case. The faint lines of exhaustion and pain that bracketed his face, the casual slope of his broad shoulders, the hint of humor at his lips. There was arrogance and strength still—Credence could recognize that particular Upper East Side strut at a hundred paces— but it was tempered with a quiet alertness common to those in law enforcement, and the wry self-deprecation of someone who realized he could still be surprised. He was still Zagreus, and now that Credence was so close, he could see the bones of resemblance, the way one day far in the future, his jaw would soften, his hair quietly radiate steel gray from the temples.

“I…,” Credence said, and unaccountably found himself unable to speak past the sore lump in his throat, at the hot spring of relieved tears in his eyes.

“Aw, kid,” Percival sighed as Credence swallowed and swallowed soundlessly, mortification and anxiety and joy and everything else rendering him paralyzed. Without waiting for his response, Percival closed the brief distance between them and swept Credence into his arms. Warmth enveloped him, and his own hands rose up to grip Percival’s coat in return. It should have been awkward—Credence was too tall, too skittish, prone to overthink, but for once, he couldn’t bring himself to care. He pressed his face into the stiff wool collar, breathing in musky smoke and cedar before realizing the growing damp patch was from his own eyes. When he tried to pull back, Percival only shushed him and held Credence closer, tighter, so he turned his face, tucked his cold nose into thick black hair, and tried not to shake apart.

‘We’re gonna be okay,” Percival murmured. “We’re all gonna be just fine.”

Credence knew that was a vastly misleading sentiment. They had many things to discuss—their own, strange interactions at the margins of Grindelwald’s conspiracy, Credence’s struggle for mastery of himself and his place in wizarding society. And he was beginning to suspect strongly that no one would be pleased to hear of the deal he’d struck with Greythorn, but he was also learning to hope, and this was as fine a prediction to start with as any.

 

 

_Many  months later  
_

There were blackberries in the summertime, from a thick patch of bramble nestled against a shallow sunny hillside and Modesty stained her fingers and mouth purple picking and tasting the best ones for pie. They returned to the house, baskets full and pleasantly warm with tart sweetness from the fruit, where Queenie tucked the basket under her arms and shooed them from the flour-dusted kitchen, instructing them to go find Tina, who was dozing by the lake.

Modesty’s fair skin was freckling to the point where Percival fondly called her a little Appaloosa, and her hair was bleaching even paler under the sun. She didn’t live with Credence, but Tina and Queenie brought her up to visit almost every weekend. It had been months, and Modesty had yet to grow sick of the wild woods surrounding Greythorn. Now, she raced Credence through the meadowsweet, raising black and orange butterflies in her wake. He followed more sedately, smiling at her good-natured taunting. Lakeside, Tina had spread out an enormous blanket that seemed impervious to the boggy ground beneath. The report she’d brought to review sat untouched, pages rustling in the warm breeze as she napped, cat-like under the sun. Tina twitched when Modesty came barreling down the path and whooping as she splashed into the shallow water. Credence chose to pick his way onto the blanket instead, settling down and hugging his knees to himself as he watched his sister swim in a lopsided, dog-style manner. After a moment, Tina sat up with a sigh and cocked her head at the water’s edge, and he shrugged, smiling. He’d never learned to swim either. She rolled her eyes fondly and hauled herself to her feet, slipped on her swim shoes and waded in to rescue Modesty from her determined flailing.

Credence watched them slowly circle the water, lulled into a sweet, golden haze, reminiscent of those early dreams he had of Greythorn and its strange, eerie beauty. And now, tied as he was to the land, he could feel the low thrum of satisfaction of the estate, rolling through his skin and up his bones. Whatever happened that night, when Credence promised his allegiance to Greythorn, the MACUSA experts had yet to fully understand. But between that and his weekly meetings with a MACUSA psychiatrist, Credence’s incidents with the Obscurus had all but vanished. And while he wasn’t exactly confined to the estate, his last trip into the city had left him feeling off kilter and unable to concentrate. This was not out of the ordinary, he had been reassured by MACUSA experts—something to do with the magical adjustment period. It wouldn’t last forever, but Credence was advised to stay at Greythorn for the rest of the summer. It wasn’t ideal, but there were worse places he could be and besides, with specialists and tutors and Modesty visiting every few days, he didn’t lack for companionship.

A faint buzz along his senses roused Credence from his daze, someone waiting at the gates of Greythorn, patient. He pushed back a pulse of approval to unlatch it, then drifted back into honied, afternoon thoughts of picnics and lake swimming and blackberry pie for dessert. When a shadow fell over him, casting a cool absence of sun over his face, he blinked awake and smiled.

“Your nose is burning,” Percival Graves, Director of Magical Security and Law Enforcement said, frowning with mild concern. He was dressed as if he'd Apparated straight from work, in a pressed cotton suit of midnight blue. His dark eyes peered out from beneath a straw Panama hat. The only concession to the heat was an unbuttoned collar of his cream shirt and a missing tie. “Haven't you heard of hats?”

“Queenie will wave it away later,” Credence replied, careless, just for the pleasure of seeing him roll his eyes. “Don't you know? She has magic.”

“Scoot,” Percival ordered, and dropped down next to him, settling comfortably onto the blanket without care for his finery. He poured himself lemonade from the tray hovering above the blanket and eyed the swim lesson that had escalated into his employee engaging in a full scale naval campaign against a nine year old. “Aren’t you surprised to see me?”

Credence huffed. “I knew you were coming.”

“Tina tell you?”

“Queenie’s making raisin rocks, which only you ever eat,” Credence told him, grinning when Percival cursed amiably.

“When you get back into the city, I’m pitting you against this year’s rookies,” Percival said. “Knock ‘em down a peg and teach ‘em that real police work is about observation.”

Credence hummed noncommittally. There were several options for him now, once his bond with Greythorn settled. A position at MACUSA, or at some wizarding research institution where he could continue his education. Even amongst the No-Majes—Queenie knew a guy, who always needed help around his bakery. But Credence thought Mr. Scamander’s offer of a short-term assistant position sounded the most interesting; to journey into Central Asia in pursuit of the legendary dragon horses of the steppes. He wasn’t yet sure how to tell the others, especially Percival, but Credence thought he might have already guessed.

The silence was companionable as they watched Modesty take a flying leap at Tina, bowling them both under the water. “The roses need pruning,” Percival said, with the impression of someone who hated having noticed yet compelled to mention regardless.

“Oh?” Credence rolled over onto his front and propped his chin up on one palm. “I can’t tell. Should I water them, you think?” His smile bloomed into a full grin at Percival’s glare of mock outrage.

“Or maybe you negotiate with Greythorn for me,” Percival said, mildly. “Grant me access on Saturdays and Sundays, and I shall come around and inspect them for you.”

“Every weekend?” Credence asked, heart speeding along.

“Only if you don’t mind,” Percival said, and his dark eyes were steady on his.

“No, n-not at all,” Credence stammered, eyes wide. “Oh, but, uh. Of- of course, this- this was your home, I wouldn’t think-” He cut himself off, and sucked in a deep breath, rolling abruptly into a sitting position. His cheeks felt hot and sunburnt, and when he glanced up, Percival had a half smile on his face, a crooked, familiar thing that was fond and quietly hopeful.

“I’d have asked to come around if you had only a cupboard in the Goldstein’s rooms,” Percival said. “I’d ask if you’d only that hideous suit you arrived in.”

Credence laughed thickly and then had to bite his lip. “I- I might leave New York. After. Not forever, only… Mr. Scamander invited me to work for him, for his next trip.” He dared not look at Percival’s face, the horrible silence that followed his words swelling tight in his chest and throat.

“Well,” Percival said gradually, and his tone wasn’t angry or hurt, so Credence managed to raise his head and meet his warm gaze. “You’ll need someone to keep an eye on your property while you’re away.”

A tentative smile tugged at Credence’s mouth as he clasped his trembling hands together. “You think so? Someone like a groundskeeper?”

Percival tipped the brim of his hat so the afternoon sunlight illuminated his brilliant, faintly rakish grin. “Oh sure. I know a guy.”

**Author's Note:**

> Commentary [here](https://chouette.dreamwidth.org/139660.html)  
> I tumbl [here](https://aiyahsimone.tumblr.com/)


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